A Dying Wish and Cunning Fox
by ChaosSolider82
Summary: My take on the Naruto story if the will of the Fourth Hokage was followed by a majority of the shinobi population along with some special requests made by the dying leader and his wife. See how I believe this would affect the Naruto tale, along with a different Naruto and a more supportive Nine-tailed fox.
1. Prologue

Prologue: Following the Disappearance of the Kyuubi no Kitsune

Just as the barrier fell, the army of shinobi gasped in shock including the Sandaime (3rd) Hokage. Their current leader, Minato Namikaze the Yondaime(4th) Hokage (Fire Shadow) the Yellow Flash, and his wife, Kushina Uzumaki, lay on the ground slowly dying cradling a baby with blond hair and three whisker scars on each cheek between them. The Sandaime Hokage, Hizuren Sarutobi, approached slowly and spoke, "Minato, what happened?"

"Sarutobi-sama, we were ambushed by a man in an orange spiral mask with a Sharingan eye at the safe house. He held Naruto hostage after killing your wife Biwako and our ANBU guard. He forced me away from Kushina long enough to rip the Kyuubi out of her and put it under his control via a contract genjustu. The attack on the village was not the Kyuubi's fault or of its free will. Kushina and I were able to free it and reseal it in our son Naruto here after I defeated the masked man," said Minato weakly. Hearing this Hizuren was saddened and pissed that his wife was gone, but that someone had been strong enough to force the Kyuubi under their control. The rest of the shinobi of the village were terrified that someone was able to perform such a feat.

Kushina looked away from her son to the Hokage and weakly spoke, "Can you quickly get Fugaku Uchiha, Kakashi, and Hizashi & Hiashi Hyuuga here?"

The said men who were standing on the front lines jumped over to the dying pair. Fugaku having just arrived to the scene after he and his clan finished securing the village. Minato turned to Kakashi and the Hyuuga brothers. "Kakashi, I want you to watch out for my son. Please treat him like a brother as I have always hoped you would. As your sensei I viewed you and your teammates as family. Make me proud. Hizashi, Hiashi you two are my oldest friends. I beg you to please watch over my son and his inheritance. I know you will make the right decisions for his future," plead Minato. The three men nodded with tears streaming down their faces.

At the same time Kushina was passing on her dying wish in a weak voice to Fugaku. "Fugaku-kun, please look out for my boy. The typical life of a jinchuuriki (power of human sacrifice) is soul destroying. Keep him as safe as you can and tell my students to help. Make sure Hayate teaches him my kenjutsu style and the leaf's. You and your wife are like siblings and family to me. Mikoto and I were supposed to raise our children together along with Yugana (Hiashi's wife). Let him know what love of a family is, even without me and Minato," she wept. In silent tears to prevent him from having a total breakdown, he bowed his head to this strong woman that he called a sister. Kushina smiled and turned her head back to cradling her newborn child whispering her final words to him.

Minato looked to the Sandaime and the assembled shinobi and made the request for Naruto to be seen as a hero before he and his wife too their last breaths holding their child between them. All the surrounding shinobi and even the sky wept in honor of their fallen heroes and for the orphan hero.

 **The Next Day: Council Chambers**

Hizuren Sarutobi sat with his fingers massaging his temples. The civilian council had been arguing back and forth with the shinobi council over what to do about Naruto, who was currently being tended by Fugaku Uchiha's wife Mikoto while he was in the meeting with Sarutobi.

"We should kill the demon," shrieked a civilian councilwoman with pink hair. Scanning the sides of both councils, Sarutobi saw that the civilian side was ready to follow the pink banshee's lead, while the shinobi side was looking at the civilians with fury and disgust. He would wager that given the signal every member of the shinobi council would tear through the civilians like a hot knife through butter. Although, it was surprising to Sarutobi that his old teammates and rival, Homura, Koharu, and Danzo, were silent and showing no signs of agreeing or disagreeing with either side of the council. The elders normally voted with the civilians, so seeing them stoic and un-attached was unnerving. The banshee looked like she was going to speak again, but Sarutobi cut her off.

"Enough, we will not kill the child who is right now the only one keeping the Kyuubi no Kitsune (9-tailed Fox) contained. Furthermore I will not hear any more of these ridiculous arguments for doing so now if you will excuse me I need to address the people," he said releasing some of his KI (killing intent) in order to keep the entire council quiet.

 **Later that night: Hokage's Office**

Sarutobi stared out the window of his office holding a sleeping Naruto reflecting on the day when a knock came to his door. The announcement of what had transpired in the past 24 hours was not well received. The majority of the shinobi population seemed to understand what had happened and the respected the wish of the Yondaime, but the civilians were in an up-roar. He made a quick decision banning the discussion of what truly happened to the Kyuubi and its sealing inside Naruto under the pain of torture and death. "Enter," he called out. When he turned he saw Homura, Koharu, and Danzo walking in. "What can I help you with," he asked curiously at their unusually sedate attitudes. Homura looked at the baby in Sarutobi's arms and said "Such a small boy to carry such a heavy burden."

Koharu spoke next, "He will need to be strong, but if I remember from what Mito-sama said love is required to keep the Kyuubi calm and at bay. May I hold him?" Sarutobi in shock handed the baby to her and was startled even further when she held him tenderly and started to coo to him like a normal grandmother would.

Danzo seeing his rival's state chuckled softly before he spoke. "Sarutobi, we represent the civilians on the council but we are not stupid to be confused between prisoner and warden. However, we cannot afford to show the civilians we don't support them since we are only elected officials to the council. We do however need to discuss what will happen to this young one. Now before you jump to conclusions, yes I believe that he needs to be trained to be a weapon for the village, but I know if he were made into an emotionless tool it would only be detrimental to the village. A jinchuuriki's power and the ability to draw on the power of their bijuu is determined by their emotions. Plus I fear for the retribution that his parents would deliver to any that would seek to use him in such a way. " Sarutobi was now shocked beyond belief, but he quickly snapped out of this state.

"So what do you propose that we do?" Sarutobi asked.

Homura, Koharu, and Danzo glanced at each other and nodded. Kohara stepped forward handing Naruto back to Sarutobi and said, "Since you have made it knowledge of his jinchuuriki status, and the law preventing the mention of it, I say we attempt to give Naruto a normal life and let him be adopted. This way he might have a chance to grow up in a nurturing environment. When he reaches the proper age enroll him in the academy, and when he graduates give him his inheritance from his mother, his father's when he reaches the age of 18 or chunin which ever happens first. However, he should not be given his father's name due to the many enemies he had. His mother's name should reduce the number of threats against him. At some point find him a tutor on how to run a clan since the boy is the heir to two of Konoha's (Leaf's) most powerful clans."

Danzo having already talked with the other elders about this scenario decide to voice his opinion by saying, "Sarutobi, you can have your ANBU guard him, but I would like to have one of my ROOT agents befriend him and act as a body guard in the future also. This way Naruto can be protected and monitored for safety. I have a feeling this boy is going to need the friendship and security in the future if he is anything like his parents." Homura nodded his agreement to the other elder's opinions. Sarutobi looked at the child in his arms and sighed in relief.

"You three are right. I had many doubts in my mind in regards on how to handle the situation. Danzo, although ROOT is shrouded in questionable practices in general and now that I have had a few years of being retired and reflected on my past mistakes/weaknesses, I can see the benefit to the ROOT division. If you are willing, I am going to let it stay active and you can continue to head it. However, you will have to answer to me for final approval of all missions especially ones that operate outside of the Land of Fire. I would also like to look at your sealing formula and conditioning program for the members. I want to be keyed into the seal so that if I need information from them, then they can give it to me. I would also like to add two ROOT agents to my rotation of guards. I do ask that the agent you assign to Naruto be his age, not be completely void of emotions, and not sealed. I have a feeling Naruto will have his parents combined instincts when it comes to who he trusts. As for your seats on the council, after seeing the support you are willing to show to both myself and Naruto, I want you to know that in the case that you ever lose your elected positions, that all of your clans qualify for a spot in the shinobi side of the council. You have all been qualified for a while, but you have never applied, so I merely kept applications ready for all of you," said Sarutobi. Homura, Koharu, and Danzo all seemed a bit shocked and relieved by this news.

With that said every one of the elders looked at the sleeping child wearing different expressions. Homura and Koharu were gazing at the boy with twin looks of sadness and respect. Danzo looked on with happiness at the fact that his old rival and friend, Sarutobi, saw eye to eye and hope that the boy would become a strong/ powerful weapon and hero to the village. Sarutobi looked at Naruto with love and fear for the son for his late successor, while praying to Kami (god) that they were making the right choice for the boy.


	2. Chapter 1: Truth Revealed, Uzumaki Rises

**14 Years Later: Recap**

Time had passed quickly in the Hidden Leaf (Konoha) and many things had changed. To the dismay of the shinobi council, due to many of them having to take on missions again while the village recover, the civilian council had managed to gain control over the ninja academy making it easier for their children to attend and lowering the standard for passing; although, the shinobi council was able to raise the age of the graduating classes from 12 to 14 to try and compensate for the civilians meddling. The civilian council had gained other powers as well. They had despite the 3rd Hokage's law spread the knowledge of Naruto containing the Kyuubi throughout the village, and at the age of four (10 years ago) Naruto was kicked out of the orphanage. The civilian council blocked every attempt for Naruto to be adopted, especially by ninja clans like the Hyuuga and Uchiha clans, and subjected the boy to severe to sometimes life threatening beatings despite the shinobi, ANBU, elders, and Hokage trying to prevent this from happening. All of the shinobi clans did make attempts to help him though as he was often found having dinner with Fugaku's or Hiashi's families. Throughout all the hardships, Naruto was able not only to keep his heart and smile but make some true friends. Naruto forged strong ties with the clan heirs of the Nara, Aburame, Akimichi, Inuzuka, Yamanaka, Hyuuga (though interaction was slightly awkward due to Naruto and Hinata's mutual crush on each other but they were clueless to each other's feelings), Uchiha clans, along with Sai Shimura, who was Danzo's grandson and one of the top ROOT agents of his age.

It was Naruto, who at the age of 8 (6 years ago), who pulled Sasuke Uchiha out of depression/shock when his clan was slaughtered in an attempted coup to gain more power for themselves within the village. Sasuke's parents had been against the coup and were thus slaughtered in front of him and his older brother and ANBU captain Itachi. To protect Sasuke, Itachi fought and murdered the entire traitor Uchiha population, but due to the extent of the damage that was done was forced to flee the village being branded as a traitor and cause of the massacre. The village as a whole thought that Itachi had merely spared Sasuke as last act of humanity; although the shinobi population had their suspicions about the whole event. Sasuke was unaware of what really happened having only arrived in time to see his parents lying dead in their home and being confronted by Itachi with a bloody blade in his hand before being rendered unconscious by a genjutsu. Naruto helped Sasuke recover by taking the now orphan Sasuke in for a time being promising him that everything would work out in the end. When he finally came out of his depression/shock, Sasuke and Naruto developed into brothers in all but blood. However, the civilian council decided to pamper Sasuke to his ire. He decided to adopt a mask of brooding indifference and entitlement in an attempt to get them to leave him alone. Only Naruto was granted to see behind Sasuke's mask along with their trusted friends.

At the present time, it is the day of academy graduation where history is going to be made and lives changed.

 **Now: 15:45: Deep in the Forest**

Naruto sat in the middle of a clearing deep in the forest of Konoha holding the village's Forbidden Scroll of Sealing. He thought that this make-up test that was assigned by Mizuki-sensei was very suspicious, which is why he had performed the test immediately instead of when he was told to by Mizuki so that he could return the scroll before things spiraled out of control.

"Okay, let's learn something from this scroll and finally graduate," said Naruto to himself. Unfurling the scroll he searched for something to learn, and after about a minute of scanning, he found a technique that seemed very useful, the Shadow Clone jutsu (technique). The description said that it required jonin level chakra reserves and the knowledge that the produced clones gained is transferred to the caster after the clone is dispelled. Naruto took a few moments to read through the process for the jutsu and memorize it. Now Naruto was in no means as stupid as the academy file on him would lead people to think. He actually has an eidetic memory, but his mind processes thoughts/ideas/theories/strategies as fast if not faster than a member of the Nara clan, who are the village strategists, thus making his concentration for long periods of time on a single subject nearly impossible. He had also learned at a very young age that the more that he excelled or showed his intelligence the more likely and harsher the beatings that he would receive from the civilians. It was better to play the role of a loud-mouth dunce than truly be himself.

It took him 30 minutes to completely master the jutsu, and when that was done he took out a separate blank scroll and copied down two of the other jutsu from the scroll, the Exploding clone and the Bringer of Darkness. Rolling up the copy and placing it into a pocket in his pants for later, he scanned through the scroll again for something else to learn as he figured this would probably be his only chance to read from the scroll until he became Hokage. 10 minutes later he stumbled upon something with his last name on it. It was a seal labeled for the eyes of Uzumaki's only, and figuring it was a blood seal (though he was not sure how he knew that), Naruto bit his thumb and rubbed it on the seal. Instantly the seal vanished leaving a message written in the scroll along with another seal. The letter read;

Dear Surviving Uzumaki,

If you are reading this you are one of the few surviving Uzumakis still living in the Hidden Leaf Village. We, the Uzumaki, were once a powerful clan rivaling the Senju, Uchiha, and Hyuuga clans. We lived in a country known as the Hidden Whirlpool, where we thrived as swordsmen (kenjutsu) and seal makers (fuinjutsu). During the Second Great Shinobi War, our village was attacked by two of the Big Five Villages, Kumo (Cloud) and Iwa (Stone) along with some of the other smaller villages because they feared our power. Our village was allied with Konoha and was forming relations with Kiri, but neither one was able to respond to our call for help in time. Our family was very large and as such there were many branches to the Uzumaki family. Those that survived the destruction of our home fled and hid themselves throughout the Elemental nations. I myself had already settled here in Konoha having married the 1st Hokage Hashirama Senju. I know only of one member of my brother's family that was able to make it to Konoha, and as your aunt I am proud that the Uzumakis of Konoha still live. Below is a blood seal in which I have stored half of our branch of the Uzumaki's clan techniques. My scroll would have been passed down to my children and grandchildren, but the Senju bloodline made it impossible for them to truly utilize the Uzumaki jutsus. Take my scroll, learn, and pass it on to your children. The other half of our family's techniques were stored in my brother's scroll of which I know not where it is, but it should have been passed down through his family, so your family. If you find the second scroll, combine this scroll with it and more secrets of our family will be unlocked. Now I must inform you that no-one outside of Konoha knew of this fact about our family, but the Uzumaki's have a very unique kekkei genkai (bloodline inheritance limit) called "Chi no shiiru"(sealing blood). There are several parts to our kekkei genkai: First, we all have extended longevity(increased age and youth) along with an increased healing capacity; Second, by the age of 10 our chakra reserves are equal to that of a kage and continue to grow, thus making it impossible to perform the simplest of genjutsu even with perfect chakra control unless you are from the branch of our family who specialized in genjutus; Third, our chakra itself is very unique, being capable of multiple dominant elemental affinities and with perfected control (high jonin level) a form of sensing; Fourth and finally, we are born savants (naturals) when it comes to the art of fuinjutsu(seals). We are able to breakdown/understand, destroy, create, and tell who made any seal. It is my final wish that you bring the Uzumaki name and tradition honor. Hold yourself with dignity, but don't be too proud to pull a few pranks every now and then since we all love a good laugh.

Love your aunt,

Mito Uzumaki Senju

P.S. Below next to the seal is a quick jutsu that I created that I never added to the scroll because I forgot to. I would recommend that you learn it first since it will let you figure out if there are any seals nearby that you are unaware off. One of my husband's students inspired it with her unique ability to sense when a trap was nearby.

Naruto sat there in the middle of the clearing shocked beyond belief. He had thought he was just a clan less orphan whom the Hokage had just given a random name to, but in reality was one of the last surviving members of one of Konoha's founding clans and of the fabled Whirlpool Country. Iruka-sensei had made mention of the country briefly when teaching on the economy of the Land of Fire. Coming out of his shock he decided to finally learn the clan secrets of the Uzumaki. Naruto bit his thumb once again, smeared it on the blood seal, opened and began reading from the enormous scroll, bigger that the Forbidden Scroll, that appeared in front of him. Although he did learn Mito's jutsu first just to be safe.

 **Meanwhile** :

The Hokage, Hizuren Sarutobi, sat in his office looking for Naruto with is crystal ball viewing jutsu before he was forced to call a village wide search for the boy. Suddenly a knock came to his door.

"Enter," he called out. The door opened and his secretary ushered in a worried looking Iruka Umino, the academy teacher for the current graduates, and Sasuke Uchiha, rookie of the year. As his secretary closed the door, the Hokage caught the look of subtle anger that only women possess and that made him nervous. Pushing that thought away for another time, Sarutobi asked the chunin and the newly minted genin why they were here and what was bothering them. It was Sasuke who spoke first.

"Lord Hokage, as you know today was the graduation exam and while everyone in our class passed, Naruto did not. I found this to be really suspicious since as you know Naruto and I study together, therefore I know how intelligent and talented he is. After class was let out I asked Iruka-sensei if I could see Naruto's tests and the results. I found a genjutsu layered on his written exam, which that being Naruto's weakest area of skill he would have not noticed. His shuriken and kunai for the accuracy test were also tampered with making it nearly impossible for an academy student let alone a competent ninja to even attempt to pass with them. In regards to his ninjutsu skills, Naruto has never been able to do a successful clone jutsu, but I believe that is because it is genjutsu based. In short, I think that Mizuki-sensei is sabotaging Naruto setting him up to fail. I know for a fact that my best friend/rival is not dumb enough to completely fail unless he wanted to and trust me when I say that he wanted to pass today." He said firmly.

Sarutobi blinked and looked at Iruka who nodded in confirmation. "As soon as Sasuke pointed out this sabotage, I went through all of Naruto's past work and found similar results. He has been set up since day one by a majority of the academy from the evidence I found. I have tried to go back through and correct as much as I can to the records, but sadly I was only able to make it so that he passed with the minimum requirements. Due to not catching this sooner, Naruto will have to bare the title of "dead last" for his graduating class. There is nothing more that the system will allow me to do I am afraid," Iruka said sadly.

Sarutobi shook his head in dismay before speaking. "I have an urgent mission for the two of you. Given what you have just told me, I believe that Mizuki tricked Naruto into stealing the Forbidden Scroll of Sealing from my office (I am not going to mention how he got passed me). I need you two to go find Naruto, retrieve the scroll, and bring them both back here safely. If I don't hear from either of you before night fall then I will have to send all available shinobi to help look. I fear that Mizuki intends to take the scroll and kill Naruto." Iruka and Sasuke paled gaining stoic faces before nodding to the Hokage and rushing out of his office to find their blond ray of sunshine.

 **3 Hours Later: 19:25: in the forest with Naruto**

Iruka and Sasuke landed in the clearing Naruto was in, finding him sitting against a tree with the Forbidden Scroll rolled up next to him while he was reading an even larger scroll.

"Naruto!" The two of them shouted at the blond getting his attention. Naruto looked up from his current scroll, and said, "Hey guys, you found me. I take it based on the looks on your faces that my suspicions about this make up test were right, and that Mizuki-teme(bastard) was going to take the scroll from me and most likely attempt to kill me in the process," said Naruto. Iruka and Sasuke nodded dumbfounded.

"Well then, we might want to think up a strategy on how to deal with him when he gets here in an hour and a half." Naruto said with an evil fox like grin that promised pain. Iruka moved to stand in front of Naruto while Sasuke moved to his side, but the movement caused the back of his collar to shift and Naruto got a look at the back of Sasuke's neck, particularly the base of his skull right below his hair line. "Sasuke hold still for a second," commanded Naruto as he closely examined Sasuke's neck. "I guess I was not the only one to have a memory seal placed on them." He said with a frown.

Iruka and Sasuke looked confused at that statement. "What do you mean Naruto?" Sasuke asked nervously. Naruto replied, "In the Forbidden Scroll I found a message from my great something aunt, who along with providing half of our family's secret techniques explained our kekkei genkai. In short, it allows me to breakdown, destroy, create, or operate any type of seal provided that it does not have a predesigned security key or locked by a genetic code and tell who made the seal. Before you guys arrived I found that I had a memory seal placed on me that was blocking an entire day from my mind. I released it and now that I see yours I can tell you a few things about it which I don't think you will like. First that the same day that was blocked from my memory is blocked on yours. Second, this seal is hurting your chakra network specifically limiting the flow around your eyes. Finally, since my memory is back I remember that on this day you activated your Sharingan and this seal due to the poor nature, quality, and the strain on your chakra network is now preventing its activation. This is all the more reason to hate Mizuki because he made both of our seals and did as I implied before a fuck up job on them. I am going to release this seal and get it off you." Naruto made a half ram sign and touched the seal on Sasuke and channeled chakra into it. Iruka nearly went into shock at the revelation that not only did Naruto have a kekkei genkai and his fellow teacher had endangered the lives of two students with as Naruto put it fucked up seal work, but when Sasuke opened his eyes they were both blood red with two tomes in each leaving Iruka speechless. Sasuke then pulled Naruto into a headlock hug.

"O sweet Kami, Naruto thank you. My Sharingan is back and my eyes no longer hurt. No wonder I had a scowl on a good portion of the day. I remember the day I awoke my Sharingan like it was yesterday. We were walking back from the school yard and you were attacked by some drunken villagers because of what you contain." Sasuke said, but was interrupted by Iruka,

"Sasuke stop, that is an S ranked secret, not only is it forbidden to talk about but whoever told you need to be arrested and then executed."

"Sas," said Naruto calmly, "Iruka-sensei is right. The fact that I am the jailor for the 9 tailed fox is classified; we should not even be discussing it." Sasuke nodded and released the hug. He and Naruto looked to Iruka and Naruto said, "Now that I remember my secret, it can't be used against me to distract me. Now Iruka sensei, lets plan how we are going to punish Mizuki when he gets here." The three of them started to hammer out a plan with vindictive looks on their faces. Mizuki was about to learn a lesson the hard way, never piss Naruto, Sasuke, or Iruka off because it will never end in your favor.

 **Hour and a half later:**

Mizuki landed on a branch surrounding the clearing and engaged Naruto and Iruka, who was berating Naruto about there being no make-up exam. The argument escalated into Mizuki taunting Naruto and revealing that Naruto contained the 9 tailed fox; although Mizuki worded it in a way that would have made people think that Naruto was the incarnation of the fox. Then instead of being stunned, confused, and frozen in shock like he expected, Naruto and Iruka burst out into laughter.

"You really are stupid, if you thought that little piece of information would be enough to scare me. You are also an idiot to think that I would sit around here and learn nothing from the Forbidden scroll with the copious amount of time that I had it. I have a news flash for you Mizuki-teme, I have been here for a good six hours," said Naruto and Iruka disappeared into a puff of smoke. "Iruka-sensei took the scroll back to the Hokage tower about an 10 minutes ago. He did this so that you never got the opportunity to even touch the scroll and lead you into thinking I still had the scroll. Iruka sensei assigned my partner and I to stay and deal with your traitor ass. I see why you were attempting to steal and leave the village, your skills as a shinobi are horrid, especially your fuinjutsu. By the way next time you seal anything, make sure you don't have any opponents/enemies that are an Uzumaki, we are seal masters for a reason."

Mizuki made to grab the fuuma shuriken from his back to throw at Naruto, only to find that during his argument with Naruto, he had been bound tightly in ninja wire that was pulled tight the moment that he attempted to move. He struggled trying to free himself when he was hit in the jaw by a fist. Looking up Mizuki went wide-eyed staring into the Sharingan of a very pissed off and smug Uchiha before being knocked out by a second hit to the face from a Naruto shadow clone which Naruto had created after taunting Mizuki.

 **Hokage Office: 21:00**

Sarutobi stared at the two 14 year old genin, their chunin sensei and a wire bound unconscious traitor. He was thankful for the years of practicing and maintaining a poker face otherwise he would be torn between pride in the three conscious ninja before him and fury at the traitor who hindered the education of two heirs of the village. Sarutobi was also feeling some mild frustration at the recklessness of the plan, since it left two green genin versus a seasoned chunin, even if he was a poor one at that.

"Well while I will not condone your plan or that you two know a highly classified secret, you did a great job. Iruka if you would please take that trash out of my office and down to the Torture & Interrogation department. I am sure Anko and Ibiki would love some company, they have told me they have been feeling lonely for a while now." Sarutobi said with a dark smile hidden behind his hands. Iruka saluted and exited the office dragging Mizuki like a sack of potatoes making sure to hit every wall with Mizuki's head. The Hokage looked at the teens again and smile softly.

"You boys did a good job and I must commend you for completing a B-ranked mission on the day of graduation. I have a feeling you will grow into fine shinobi. Sasuke, I am glad that your Sharingan is once again active; it has been a long time since I have seen the Sharingan. As both a reward for stopping the traitor and as a precaution, I am going to set you up with a tutor. With the tutor you will start working on utilizing your dojutsu over the three weeks before team placements and if all goes well you can mature it to its final tome stage." Sarutobi said and Sasuke smiled at the thought of getting stronger to protect his precious people. Sarutobi continued, "However, Sasuke I need to speak with Naruto in private for just a moment, could you please stand outside my door we will call you back in shortly." Sasuke nodded, quickly locked eyes with Naruto and exited the room. After the door was shut, Sarutobi opened a desk drawer and pulled out a leaf headband on blue sash and gave it to Naruto, Iruka had given the headband to him so he could pass it along to Naruto.

"You have earned this headband for all your hard work Naruto. Iruka managed to go back in and correct enough of the damage done to your academy records to make it so you passed the academy. Although, due to the traitor and all the sabotage you suffered you will be labeled as the "dead-last" of the year. This just means you are going to need to work harder to take my hat one of these days. Now can you tell me what you were able to learn from the Forbidden Scroll and what the other scroll is," Sarutobi said with a curious nod to the scroll on Naruto's back.

"Well first Jiji from the Forbidden Scroll I learned the Shadow Clone jutsu and wrote down the modified Explosion Shadow Clone and Bringer of Darkness jutsus. I have attempted all of them and mastered the Shadow clone (he created a bunch of shadow clones just to prove he could do it). I still need some work on the other two. As for this larger scroll, it is the first part of my branch of the Uzumaki clan scroll that was sealed into the Forbidden Scroll under a blood seal by my great something aunt Mito Uzumaki Senju. It contains half of our branch of the family's hijutsu (secret techniques) which I am starting to learn. According to what I have read so far they can only be performed by an Uzumaki. I don't think that Sasuke's Sharingan would be able to copy them due to being clan related, like Nara's and Aburame's jutsu. She said that the reason she did not pass the scroll down to her own children/my cousins is because the Senju bloodline was too strong and dulled the Uzumaki bloodline too much. The other half of the clan scroll was given to aunt Mito's brother and passed down to his children, which I guess that would mean my family, but I don't know where it is other than in the village somewhere. I also know about my kekkei genkai, since aunt Mito described it in detail. I have started to learn to use it by focusing on seals at the moment since given the amount of time that I had in the forest and not wanting to be exhausted if it was a trap, seals made more sense to begin with. I had quite a bit of time while waiting for the traitor Mizuki to show up." Naruto stated with a foxy grin.

Sarutobi was in awe. He knew the boy was bright but this put him on the same level if not a level above the Hyuuga prodigy Neji. He called Sasuke back into the room noticing the smile his secretary gave Naruto and Sasuke, his secretary was always fond of the two boys and always let Naruto through to see him without an appointment. The three of them discussed what was going to happen in the coming weeks before the genin teams were announced. It was decided that Naruto would also get a tutor for several reasons. One to correct any damage the sabotage had done to his basic shinobi skills. Second, to start learning his family techniques. Finally, the tutor would begin teaching Naruto kenjutsu. When Naruto asked why Sarutobi revealed that he did in fact know Naruto's parents, who had expressed in their wills that they wished for Naruto to carry on the Uzumaki swordsman tradition. He also revealed that Naruto had been given his mother's name and that Mito Senju was his great-great aunt. At first Naruto was angry that this information had been kept from him by the Hokage whom was like a grandfather to him. Sasuke pointed out that this was done to protect him due to his condition and how powerful his parents probably were and he calmed down forgiving Sarutobi, but threatened some sort of prank in the future. Secretly Sarutobi was looking forward to Naruto's prank, as it always livened up the day filled with the curse of paperwork. It was also decided that Naruto would be put on a better diet and get some new gear and clothing, because even though Naruto liked the color orange he agreed that his jump suit was a giant 'kill me' target. At 23:30 the Hokage released the new genin saying he had paper work to do along with trying to find the location of the second Uzumaki scroll. Stopping at the door Naruto turned and asked,

"Jiji why do you torture yourself doing all the paper work when you could have shadow clones do the work since they transfer what they learn when they dispel? I mean you are infamous for using its shuriken variant." The boys left the office with the Hokage weeping while banging his head against his desk realizing he had the weapon to thwart paperwork all this time.

After having dropped off Mizuki to the Torture and Interrogation department, Iruka made his way back home. When he got to his department, he locked the door while toeing off his sandals. Iruka walked to the bedroom while stripping off his clothing and smiled when he saw the familiar form of his lover in their bed, silver grey hair splayed on the pillow that they were occupying. Iruka gently climbed into bed, cuddling up to his lover and whispering "Kakashi-kun, I have some great news for you. Naruto is now a genin and most likely will be put on your squad. Soon everything will be the way that it should be." Kakashi turned over and wrapped his arms around Iruka bringing the man closer to him. Iruka smiled before drifting off to sleep.


	3. Chapter 2: Teams, Trust, and Takedowns

Special notes:

*Massive Sakura bashing. I am not her biggest fan while she was a fangirl

* Ino will not be a fan girl of Sasuke's. I felt that as a clan heiress it did not make much sense that she would be so lax.

*Gekkou Hayate will not be sickly with a cough. I felt this made him less bad ass than he truly was.

*There will be unique hand-signs for Uzumaki jutsu and seals which are: bat, shark, turtle, fox, toad, beetle, ape, crab, shinigami, kami, yami, elk, bear, owl, wolf, and cougar.

*There will not be any real Kakashi bashing in this story. He will be under the civilian council's thumb until Tsunade takes over along with another two surprises.

*The reasoning behind the three weeks between the test and the team assignments is two-fold. In my mind a leader of any kind would want to insure that his subordinates with new weapons were properly trained and orientated to them before sending them out into the field. In this case the Sharingan and Naruto's remedial training.

* I am also going to be italicizing internal thoughts of the characters, bold for the bijuu, bold and italicizing bijuu thoughts, and underlining if it is a jutsu.

 **08:00 Konoha Ninja Academy Room 305** :

Naruto sat in the back of the room listening to Iruka-sensei's final speech before team assignments thinking about the last three weeks since the Mizuki incident. He had made great use of the shadow clone jutsu in his training. In Naruto's opinion that while many people might find the method of using shadow clones to train multiple subjects at once as cheating, for him it was using something to its fullest and to his advantage. From the Uzumaki scroll, Naruto had begun to practice the first taijutsu (hand to hand) style of the Uzumakis, the "Rolling Tides style". It resembled Baguazhang due to its circular motions and ability to perform great damage without huge amounts of personal force although it was mostly a defensive style. Naruto had become very proficient with using seals. In addition to learing the traditional theory for sealing, he had mastered roughly 60% of the Uzumaki fuinjutsu from his aunt's scroll and had made several of his own personal seals of which he had added to the scroll. Naruto was training to make seals mid-combat, though he was still limited to having to physically write them as opposed to inscribing the seal with only his chakra. Through heavy use of shadow clones, Naruto had also mastered quite a few of his clan ninjutsu, which after a spar with Sasuke his theory was confirmed that the Sharingan was not able to copy them. Naruto's biggest improvement by far rivaling his success in ninjutsu and fuinjutsu was his kenjutsu. His tutor Gekkou Hayate was very proud to say the least of his quick progress. It was because of Hayate that Naruto became even more driven to make his dreams a reality. Naruto's dreams/goals evolved during his training, and now his dream was become the village's greatest swordsman and surpass all the previous Hokages especially the second and fourth. Hayate also managed to give Naruto something other than training. He gave Naruto a connection to his family that even the Hokage could not give him (though not for a lack of trying).

 **FLASHBACK** :

Hayate told Naruto to finish the kata (form) he was doing and join him for a moment. Hayate was beyond proud of his student, who in the first week of training after obtaining the proper ninja gear had mastered the basics levels of Leaf style kenjutsu and learned the first of the intermediate techniques the "Dance of the Crescent Moon". Hayate had his suspicions that Naruto might be a true kenjutsu prodigy since he absorbed kenjutsu like a sponge. He believed Naruto had the ability to make a legend of himself just like his parents.

"What did you want to talk about Hayate-sensei?" Naruto asked panting a little from his workout. Naruto took his kenjutsu training seriously and always put 100% effort into it, therefore his exhaustion was normal.

"Naruto you have blown away my every expectation for you so far. Your rate of progression is simply astounding. Your shadow clones have managed to bring your chakra control to somewhere around mid to high chunin level, and your ninjutsu, fuinjutsu, and kenjutsu are at very least mid chunin. You have even managed to reduce the number of hand-signs you need for them down and some even sign less. You are mastering the sword faster than predicted since it took me a year and a half to even start learning the "Dance of the Crescent Moon" and you reached that point in a week." Hayate said causing Naruto to blush a little at the praise.

"Now on a more serious note Naruto, I have been given permission to inform you of a few things. First, after you get your team assignment I will still be teaching you kenjutsu since I know for a fact that your team sensei does not know much in the way of the sword. Second, it has been decreed by the Hokage and the elders that I may reveal to you that when I was a genin, your mother was my jonin sensei. You must never tell anyone without express permission from me, your jonin sensei, the elders, or the Hokage. Your mother's name was Kushina Uzumaki. I cannot tell you too much or your curious mind might dig into stuff you are not allowed to know yet, but I can tell you some stories of the time I knew her. She was the best and most feared swordswoman in her time along with being a master of Eddy style kenjutstu. I was taught some of the Eddy style and will be teaching you what I know until your mother's scroll is found. I can also tell you that I viewed your mother like a second mother and I see so much of her in you, especially your prankster nature. She made her squad participate in some of her pranks as a form of training. You should know Naruto that she loved you very much and would be proud of how far you have come," said Hayate.

Naruto's eyes were overflowing with tears staring at his sensei in awe. He spoke in a hopeful whisper, "Hayate-sensei when you are not teaching me, would it be okay if I were to call you nii-san (older brother), since mom was your sensei."

"I would be more than honored otouo (little brother). You have no idea how much I and the other students of both of your parents wish we could have been able to be around you more growing up. I am here now and I think the Hokage will soon let the others know that the restrictions of the civilian council no longer apply thus they will show themselves to you. So don't be mad at them. We were restricted by the civilian council since you were not a shinobi at the time." Hayate exclaimed enveloping Naruto in a tight hug.

 **FLASHBACK END** :

Naruto was happy that he was finally learning about his parents and that he shared some of their qualities without even having known them. It also made him very emotional to have an official older brother figure other than Iruka to look too and model himself after. In fact on the day of taking his registration photo for his ninja license, Naruto earned himself younger brother by the name of Konohamaru Sarutobi.

 **Flashback:**

Naruto was waiting impatiently for the photographer to take his photo for his shinobi registration. The photographer, obviously a civilian, was glaring at Naruto who was sporting his orange jump suit and a huge fox like grin. He had originally thought about doing some elaborate war paint in order to make people under-estimate him, but Hayate had convinced him out of it saying that the henged jumpsuit was enough of a prank and underestimation. Hayate was relieved that that logic had worked because Naruto was in pranking mode. The special jonin had enough trouble when Kushina-sensei wanted to prank someone, and her son was just as bad as her if not worse.

"Are you ready punk," the camera man snarled.

"Yes just take the picture," Naruto said through his fox grin. _Why are they letting a civilian do this. If anyone should take the photo of a ninja it should be another ninja._ Naruto thought to himself not knowing that deep in his subconscious the Kyuubi agreed. After the photo was taken and the camera man handed him is identification card, Naruto quickly went to the Hokage's office to finish his paper work.

Naruto finished the paper work and the Hokage double checked it before signing off on it. The two were having a nice chat about how Naruto's training was coming and how the Hokage was enjoying having his shadow clones do his paper work. Already the clones had managed to catch a few tax rulings that the civilian council was trying to slide passed him. Their conversation was interrupted by the office doors being thrown open and young boy wearing a helmet and ridicoulsly long scarf ran in the office claiming that he was going to beat the Hokage and take the hat from him. Before the kid got too far into the room he tripped on his scarf. Naruto just stared at the boy in disbelief and the Hokage sighed in exhaustion as this was the boy, his grandson's fifth attempt today. The boy got up just as a ninja dressed in all black ran into the room after the boy. The kid looked around and spotted Naruto staring at him.

"You tripped me!" The kid shouted pointing a finger accusingly at Naruto. The boy's tutor/nanny tried to point out to the boy that he had merely tripped; however, the boy was adamant that Naruto had tripped him. Naruto, not liking being accused for something he did not do stood, moved in front of the kid and yanked him up into the air by his collar.

"Listen here you little brat, you tripped over your own scarf. Don't blame me just because you wore that choking hazard." Naruto said loudly to the boy.

"Put the Honorable grandson down now boy," demanded the boy's tutor. The ninja was giving Naruto a very dark look which Naruto, the Hokage, and the hidden anbu in the room noticed. Naruto looked at the boy who was smirking at him and back to the Hokage, who nodded in confirmation. Naruto would have just put the boy down and walked away, but the boy decided to be mouthy and claimed that Naruto could not hurt him. With that statement went Naruto's patience.

"I don't care if the Hokage is your grandmother! I will not be blamed for something that I did not do!" Naruto shouted bringing his fist down on top of the boy's helmet just hard enough to make the kid a little dizzy. After delivering the blow, Naruto bowed to the Hokage and left the office. During the ensuing fretting by the boy's tutor, who the Hokage identified as Ebisu, the boy managed to slip out of the office to follow Naruto.

The boy, Konohamaru, followed Naruto around the village in various poor disguises. Naruto found the attempts at following him amusing, but after a time, he got annoyed and confronted him. After some begging and embarrassment, Naruto agreed to teach Konohamaru is Sexy jutsu but only under the condition that Konohamaru used the jutsu to embarrass the Hokage, expose perverts, and to deal with perverts. Several hours of practice later, both boys were sitting on a log in a random training field having a snack.

"So why do you want to defeat the old man so badly," Naruto asked.

"My grandfather named me after the village. Everyone, whenever they see me or call me, the only see me as the grandson of the Hokage. Nobody recognizes me as an individual. I am tired of it. That is why I want to be Hokage right now. So that people will respect me for me." Konohamaru stated vehemently.

"Konohamaru, I understand your feeling," Naruto said gently with a small twinge of sadness in his own voice. "I know that not being recognized for who your truly are is a hard thing to deal with but look at it this way. Someday if you work hard and strive to be the best you can be then people will most assuredly see you as Konohamaru Sarutobi. Defeating your grandfather will not get you that. There is no short cut to being Hokage." Konohamaru sat there absorbing what Naruto said while they continued eating their snack. It was at that time that Ebisu showed up and tried to take Konohamaru away from Naruto stating that the punk could not help him reach his full potential because only and elite could. This pissed off both young men, and they together decided to lay a beat down on Ebisu. Konohamaru tried to knock Ebisu out with his Sexy Jutsu, but this hardly affected the special jonin. Naruto's Sexy Harem Jutsu, did however produce the desired result of sending the man into the unconscious world.

"Wow that was ingenious, Boss!" Konohamaru exclaimed.

"Well what do you expect from the future Hokage." Naruto said with a grin.

"You are going to be the Hokage someday? That means from this pint on we are rivals!" Konohamaru stated giving Naruto a friendly but challenging look. Naruto smiled and nodding at him. Konohamaru smiled back and was about to run off but instead pitched forward sleepily. Naruto caught him before he hit the ground, and then situated Kono onto his back before taking the boy home. As he dropped of the sleeping boy to his mother at the Sarutobi compound, Konohamaru sleepily called Naruto nii-san, which caused Naruto and the boy's mother to smile.

 **Flashback End:**

Naruto tuned back into class as Iruka-sensei/senpai (means superior) listed off the team assignments, though he mentioned that there would have to be a team of four this year due to the graduating numbers. The first 6 teams flew by quickly all civilian students.

"Team 7 will be Sasuke Uchiha, Sai Shimura, Sakura Haruno, and Naurto Uzumaki. Your jonin sensei will be Kakashi Hatake," Iruka announced earning a high pitched squeal from Sakura, when she heard she was on Sasuke's team. However, she started ranting about being place on a team with two freaks. Iruka ignored her outburst and continued on, "Team 8 will be Kiba Inuzuka, Hinata Hyuuga, Shino Aburame, and your sensei is Kurenai Yuuhi. Team 9 is still in rotation. Team 10 will be Shikamaru Nara, Choji Akimichi, Ino Yamanaka, and your jonin sensei is Asuma Sarutobi. That is it; please wait here for you senseis. Good luck as ninja and may Kami smile on you all." With that Iruka left the room smiling at his former students. Almost immediately the senseis for teams 1-6, 8, and 10 arrived, leaving tem 7 in the room by themselves.

 **Three Hours Later** :

The four genin were getting annoyed to say the least. Their sensei was three hours late with no sign of showing up. Sasuke had pulled out some ninja wire and was fiddling with it. Sakura was staring at Sasuke with hearts in her eyes trying to convince him to go on a date with her. Sai had taken out a blank canvas and was painting, while Naruto was reading a large book which in reality was his family scroll transformed and indexed for convenience. Suddenly, the door to the class room opened and explosion rocked the room throwing the one who opened the door into the class room wall. The person revealed to be a man with gravity defying silver hair and his Leaf headband over his left eye stood up and stared at them.

"Who booby-trapped that door!" The man shouted staring down the four genin.

Sasuke put away his wire, looked at the man with annoyance written all over his usually brooding face and said, "I warned you not to be late sensei. My teammates and I are not always the most patient people. As for the booby-trap, it was a three man job with myself rigging the wire, Naruto providing the low-grade explosive note, and Sai camouflaging the note so it would be undetectable." The man now identified as Kakashi raised his one visible eyebrow then spoke,

"My first impression of you is…..annoying. Meet me on the roof in five minutes," Kakashi said before disappearing in a swirl of leaves. Five minutes later when the four of them arrived on the roof Kakashi was waiting for them reading a book (Icha Icha) for perverts (despite what the general populace thought, Kakashi is not reading the sex scenes in the story only the romance portion in order to form idea's for the people in his life).

"Alright now that we are all here, let's do introductions." Kakashi said.

"Um, sensei could you give us an example?" Sakura asked making the guys internally sweat drop.

"Okay, my name is Kakashi Hatake. I have likes & dislikes, and my dream you are too young to understand," stated Kakashi while everyone sweat dropped from only having learned his name. Kakashi pointed to Sakura indicating for her to proceed.

"I am Sakura Haruno. I like," looks at Sasuke and giggles, "I dislike freaks like Naruto and Sai. My hobbies are flower arranging and hanging out with Ino. My dream is," she looks at Sasuke again dissolving into a fit of giggles. Kakashi groaned mentally about having a bloody fan-girl on his team that stated dislike towards two of her teammates. Sasuke shivered at her looks and giggles. Kakashi pointed at Sai to go next.

"My name is is Sai Shimura and my likes are training, my grandfather Danzo/family, and my friends. My dislikes include art thieves, traitors, child abusers, and those who cannot tell the difference between the kunai and the scroll it is sealed into (with a slight glance at Naruto that only Kakashi, Sasuke and Naruto saw). My hobbies are painting, training, learning new things, and spending time with friends. My dream is to take over my grandfather's position when he is ready to retire and help my friends achieve their dreams," he said. Kakashi nodded internally pleased that a ROOT member was able to have genuine dreams and friends. Although Sarutobi had approved of the ROOT program, many of the jonin of the village were weary of the agents. He turned to Sasuke and nodded to him, though he already knew what he was going to say after all he had been tutoring the teen on mastering his Sharingan, which the teen had managed to finally evolve it only a day ago.

"My name is Sasuke Uchiha. I like training, learning new things, and my best and oldest friend/rival Naruto. I dislike being treated like royal/elite, fan-girls, those that harm those I hold as my precious people. My hobby is reading in my spare time, and my dream is to one day restore my clan, and bring my brother in for interrogation about the slaughter of our clan." Sasuke said. The others looked were looking at him with varying faces. Sakura was looking at him with hearts in her eyes oblivious to Sasuke's anti-fan-girls statement. Sai was smirking at finding another ally in the true Sasuke and not the brooding avenger persona. Naruto was beaming that his friend had finally dropped his mask and was opening up to people. Kakashi just eye smiled and looked at Naruto.

"Lastly, go ahead Blondie," said Kakashi.

"Yosh, the name is Naruto Uzumaki. I like training, new jutsu, kenjutsu, ramen, my clan techniques, foxes because they are cunning, toads because they are adaptable, and my precious people. I dislike child abusers, rapists, traitors, people who judge others without cause, and the three minutes it takes to make instant ramen. My hobbies include reading, cooking (food other than ramen), and pulling pranks. My dream is to surpass the previous Hokages and to make my parents proud by being both Hokage and a kenjutsu master!" Naruto exclaimed with a huge fox grin, while Sasuke Sai and Kakashi smiled. However, Sakura sneered and then made the stupid mistake of saying,

"You become Hokage, fat chance. You are just a dead last orphan with no skill. So stop dreaming about becoming anything freak."

The temperature on the roof dropped instantly like the sun went out as Naruto's smile was crushed. Kakashi stared at the girl in disbelief that she could be so heartless. Sasuke was appalled and his face showed how much he was disgusted, contorted with rage at how she insulted his oldest and truest friend. Sai's face mirrored the complete unadulterated fury he felt, and even though he prided himself on his calm and patience could not control himself now.

"Shut up you useless cunt! You have no right to speak to Naruto like that. While it may be true that he is an orphan, but that gives no justification to him giving up on his dreams. Naruto and Sasuke are both orphans but you treat Sasuke like a god. The next time you open your mouth to insult him, I will personally cut out your tongue with a rusty dull kunai!" Sai shouted at Sakura.

Sakura looked at Sai confused about by the comparison between Naruto and Sasuke, but understood the threat well enough to keep quiet. Kakashi mentally was both praising Sai and scolding him for standing up for Naruto because his defense may have just impaired the potential teamwork of the squad. Sasuke during the tirade had gone over to console Naruto, who was in a quiet depressed state. Deciding to change the subject, Kakashi addressed the genin.

"Okay moving on, tomorrow you are to meet me at training ground 7 at 07:00. There will be a test to see if you are ready for being full members of the shinobi core. Bear in mind that this test has a 66% failing rate, a 30% success rate, and a 4% death rate. You might not want to eat before or you will throw up. Ja-ne!" Kakashi stated before vanishing in another swirl of leaves. The four genin separated for the day, the guys heading out to train together to blow off some steam and Sakura went home to call and gossip with Ino.

 **Next Morning: 07:00: Training Ground 7** :

All the male members of Team 7 were waiting at the training grounds when Sakura ran up to them panting. After she caught her breath and looked up she was surprised by what she saw. Normally she would be all eyes for Sasuke, but she was awestruck by Naruto. Yesterday she had seen him with the hideous orange jumpsuit as he had been wearing his henge due to the civilian students who might inform their parents. Today Naruto was dressed completely different and more like a professional shinobi. Naturo with his height of 5 feet 5 inches (the proper diet gave him a bit of a growth spurt along with the Kyuubi intentionally manipulating its chakra in Naruto to help him) was dressed in black shinobi sandals, camouflage ANBU style pants with multiple side pouches, kunai holster strapped to his right thigh, dark forest green long sleeved v neck cut shirt which showed off a dark orange mesh guard muscle shirt along with the Uzumaki emblem secured to his left shoulder. His blue headband tied around his forehead, and he was wearing a pair of shades over his ocean blue eyes. Sasuke and Sai were wearing their regular attire with the exception of Sai carrying a tanto across of his back. Deciding that she should try and start on a better note than yesterday Sakura spoke to the group.

"Good morning Sai-san, Sasuke-kun, Naruto-san. Your new look suits you Naruto-san."

"Thanks," was all Naruto said stiffly obviously still sore from her verbal abuse yesterday. Sakura did not notice and began to fawn over Sasuke while Naruto and Sai sat down in the grass to wait for their sensei.

 **Three Hours Later: 10:00** :

Kakashi walked onto the training ground and saw an interesting sight. Sai was meditating at the base of the three poles in the field; Sakura was staring up at a tree branch while Sasuke was sitting on a high tree branch practicing his hand sign speed. However the interesting thing was that Kakashi did not see Naruto anywhere in sight.

"Where is Naruto?" He questioned the students that were present.

Sai opened his eyes, sighed, slowly stood up, and looking at Kakashi said, "Naruto left five minutes ago to go apologize and reschedule his training with Hayate-senpai. I had to do the same with my grandfather about an hour ago. Naruto should be back momentarily." As if on cue, Naruto ran up the training ground apologizing for not being present right away. The genin all formed a line in front of their sensei.

Kakashi made a mental note to coordinate training schedules with the other teachers should they pass this test. He then went on to explain the bell test to the genin. The object of this test was to obtain the two bells that were on his belt within a two hour time. Sakura questioned what would happen to the two that did not grab a bell, to which Kakashi answered that they would be sent back to the academy. He set the timer for two hours and began the test. (Note: Since Naruto is more mature in this story the scene where Kakashi restrained him did not happen) All four of the genin jumped into the surrounding woods. _This will be interesting to see if teamwork is in their vocabulary_ Kakashi thought to himself.

As soon as he was a good safe distance from Kakashi and hidden, Naruto created a mass of ten shadow clones. He divided his chakra up in seven of them to make them more durable. He sent seven off to distract Kakashi and the other three to collect his teammates. Naruto then started making hand signs (Toad-Crab-Ape-Turtle), "Hijutsu 4 trigrams: Chakra Hiding Barrier," Naruto said softly placing his hands on the ground erecting a 7x7x7 foot blue barrier. The Barrier was visible for a minute then vanished along with Naruto. Five minutes later Sasuke and Sai landed next to Naruto, the clones having been able to open the barrier for them to enter.

"So I take it we all saw through the obvious lie and figured out the true meaning behind the test right," said Naruto. The other two nodded and smirked looking accomplished. Suddenly a shadow flashed across Naruto's face causing him to frown. With a tone of disappointment he said, "Sakura refuses to be tricked by me into failing this test, or looking weak in front of you Sasuke by accepting help. She will not be joining us. My clone is going to watch over her." They guys all sighed that the kunoichi (female ninja) of the year could not see through the obvious deception. The guys spent the next 20 minutes discussing possible strategies on how to get the bells from their sensei. Suddenly an explosion was heard from Kakashi's direction, which had caused Sasuke and Sai get into a defensive stance searching for danger. Naruto, however, just winced a little with a smile.

"Don't worry guys it was just one of my clones that I sent to distract Kakashi-sensei exploding. Apparently he saw through most of my shadow clones, so one turned into an exploding clone. Also Sakura got caught by Kakashi in a basic genjutsu moments after the clone went off. If we want to pass this teamwork test, then we need to adjust our plan from full on assault to a rescue mission." Naruto stated and they went back to strategizing for another 20 minutes.

 **With Kakashi and Clones: 20 minutes ago:**

Kakashi was standing in the clearing waiting for an attempt to get the bells. He knew where three of his students were; Sakura was hiding under some bushes to his right, Sai was in a tree in the center behind the trunk, and Sasuke was hiding in a tree to the left, but he could not figure out where Naruto was. _At least they have some skill in stealth. They are not perfect but decent. Well minus Naruto, though that is not surprising since he was capable of hiding from ANBU while wearing the kill me orange jumpsuit. The only person ever able to find him when he is hiding is Iruka-kun_ , Kakashi mused. He caught sight of some slight movement by Sai and Sasuke and prepared for an attack, but when nothing came he was suspicious. That is until 'Naruto' jumped out of the bushes in the middle throwing a volley of kunai at him while charging toward him. Kakashi caught a few of the kunai while dodging others and returned the ones he caught.

"You know you are a strange. Charging in head first against someone who is stronger than you is not a very good idea let alone not a very ninja tactic," Kakashi taunted. 'Naruto' dodged the returned kunai and got close enough to Kakashi to throw a punch. Kakashi caught the fist and tossed 'Naruto' over him. Marking that 'Naruto' was slightly heavier than he looked Kakashi said, "First skill of a ninja Taijutsu." While still having his book open Kakashi easily evaded 'Naruto's' wild punches and kicks. After deciding to point out how bad 'Naruto's' brawling style was, Kakashi slipped under Naruto's guard and performed the secret taijutsu move "A Thousand Years of Death" launching 'Naruto' into the river. He was about to go test Sasuke and Sai when 6 more Narutos jumped out from various hiding places and surrounded him. _O that's right Naruto knows the shadow clone jutsu. While he was fighting me he had these guys waiting in the wings clever,_ Kakashi thought. The clones charged going through a few hand signs before shouting in unison "Sexy Harem jutsu". The next moment Kakashi was in the middle of a group of well-endowed naked blond women smoke just barely covering them rubbing up against him whispering sweet nothings to him. He was so taken a back that he almost missed the two with kunai in their hands one aiming for his heart the other for the bells. Kakashi performed a substitution with a nearby log and after appearing behind the harem he made the hand seals/signs necessary and blew out a huge fireball dispelling the clones.

"Second skill of a ninja, Ninjutsu," said Kakashi with a slight nose bleed hidden by his mask (normally the Sexy harem Jutsu would have had a better effect on all perverts, but Kakashi is a special case) glancing at the spots where he had spotted the genin before to find only Sakura was still in the same spot. Sasuke and Sai were gone. Before he could go find the other two genin, Kakashi had to duck two mid-air kicks from a wet 'Naruto'. 'Naruto's' kicks just barely missed Kakashi. Kakashi caught 'Naruto's' follow-up jab and tossed him across the field; although Kakashi noted that this was a more fluid/formed style of taijutsu not the previous brawler style. As 'Naruto' landed, Kakashi threw a few shuriken at him before doing another few hand seals saying "Shadow Shuriken jutsu", which caused the shuriken to multiply leaving no room for 'Naruto' to dodge. Instead, 'Naruto' ran through his own hand seals (Turtle-Beetle-Crab-Bear), which shocked Kakashi. He had only ever seen the hand seals 'Naruto' was using by his sensei's late wife Kushina. 'Naruto' finished signing saying calmly, "Eddy Hijutsu: Single Guardian Dome". A blue dome of chakra formed around 'Naruto' which completely deflected the oncoming shuriken. After the shuriken had all passed or been deflected 'Naruto' dropped the jutsu. He scanned the area for Kakashi but could not find him until it was too late.

"Earth style: Double decapitation Suicide," Kakashi's voice called out as his hands sprang up from the ground grabbing 'Naruto's' ankles and pulled him under ground. After he surfaced Kakashi looked at 'Naruto' and said, "That was a good strategy of trying to keep me off balance with your clones and using it to your advantage. Who knows in a few years you might be able to take me by surprise."

"Well then joke's on you sensei," taunted 'Naruto' with an evil grin.

"O, how so?" Kakashi asked humoring his student.

"Boom," said 'Naruto' who then exploded sending Kakashi back several yards for cover. _Damn gaki (brat), he knows the exploding shadow clone too. Was he ever here after the start of the test?_ Kakashi thought to himself. Deciding that he needed to find and test the others, he went and dispatched Sakura with ninja skill three genjutsu. He was about to leave her to wake up on her own when he caught a glimpse of Naruto in the tree above them. Kakashi was going to make a move toward him, but Naruto puffed out of existence before he could. So Kakashi grabbed Sakura and tied her to the middle pole and stood scanning the area for Sasuke and Sai once again.

Twenty minutes later Kakashi was getting very agitated. His three remaining genin were still hiding with 75 minutes left to take the bells from him, but none had made an attempt. Topping it of that Sakura had woken up five minutes ago and had been constantly calling out for her "Sasuke-kun" to help her. Needless to say it was getting on Kakashi's nerves.

"Shut up! Your whining is irritating," shouted Kakashi unleashing a little KI. Strangely it did not affect the whining girl one bit. That's when Kakashi noticed the slight wind that was present earlier had vanished. He realized too late that he was in a genjutsu. "Kai," he shouted releasing the illusion. As soon as the illusion dispersed Kakashi saw Naruto untying Sakura and he made to stop him. However, he was intercepted by two ink lions that came out from the bushes and began attacking him. The lions lunged every time Kakashi made a move toward the posts, often switching positions with every lunge. After a minute of this Kakashi saw a gap attempting to make a break through it, but found he was bound in wire. He came to the realization that the lions were not only guarding Naruto thus letting him untie Sakura, but were weaving this trap. At that moment Naruto finished untying the last rope, grabbed Sakura, and called out,

"Now!" Kakashi's one visible eye widened as Sasuke jumped from the bushes quickly going through hand seals and Kakashi recognized the jutsu he was preparing. He tried to free himself only to find his feet stuck in the ground. Suddenly Sai, sprung up from the ground a few yards away saying "Earth style: Ant hill foot lock," and just as he said this Sasuke unleashed a fireball at Kakashi.

When the fire cleared, a charred log was in place of Kakashi and the two lions disappeared in a puff of smoke while the guys stood guard over their recently freed teammate. Just then the timer went off and Kakashi appeared before them with no damage from the fire ball (the genjutsu had distorted his internal clock meaning that 70 minutes had passed before he had realized he was being influenced [before you start saying this is unrealistic, let us be honest and admit that illusions are not Kakashi's strong point and without the use of the Sharingan it would take him longer to notice a very subtle genjutsu]).

"Well it looks like you are out of time and the bells are still with me. So you fail," said Kakashi and was about to continue when he heard the jingle of bells. Looking at the sound he saw the bells in Naruto's hands and checking his waist saw that indeed the bells were gone. "How did you manage to get them?" Kakashi asked flabbergasted.

"When you were under Sasuke's genjutsu, I snagged them before helping Sakura." Naruto said, and all the guys smirked.

"Okay Naruto, since you got the bells who are you going to have pass the test," questioned Kakashi to see if they truly understood the test. Surprisingly Naruto handed the bells to Sakura and Sai who in turn gave it to Sasuke. "Well it seems like you truly did understand the point behind the test, which was that teamwork is the most important thing. However, this lesson is not easily learned. Congratulations you all pass and we are officially a team, but heed these words: Those that disobey orders are trash, but those who abandon their comrades are worse than trash." Kakashi stated with an eye smile. He was about to dismiss them, when Sai spoke,

" Since we are now officially a team, I must inform you all that while a genin in ranking of the formal shinobi core I am also a member of ROOT. This is an ANBU sub-organization run by the village elder Danzo. He in turn is commanded by the Hokage, but ROOT runs even more secretive operations than the regular ANBU and acts as an underground homeland security. As a member of the Shimura clan I have been part of ROOT all of my life. ROOT agents are given emotional conditioning in order to insure mission efficiency and mental stability due to the nature of our missions. Therefore while our friendships are genuine, as a ROOT member I was assigned to guard Sasuke, as he is the last Uchiha, and Naruto, as the last Uzumaki. I hope you can forgive me for the secrecy, but know that I have always been looking out for you with the best intentions."

There was silence for a moment before Sasuke spoke, "Sai, if anything I respect you even more than I did before for being able to keep this a secret. Also other than Naruto, you are one I consider to be a close friend and rival." Kakashi eye smiled and Sakura beamed at Sasuke's words, though not fully absorbing what Sai was saying. Naruto approached Sai and captured him into a hug.

"Thanks for telling us Sai, but when you go on missions for ROOT don't bottle up anything bad or shoulder too much. We are your friends and teammates, you can trust us if you need to confide in us. Although if you start to bottle up and withdraw from us, I will kick your ass until you are unconscious and drag you to Danzo-ojisan and the nearest Yamanaka mental healer," Naruto said with a mock threat. After that was done the four genin went to grab some well-deserved lunch as a team while Kakashi went to the Hokage's office to report the results of the test.

 **Hokage's Tower: Conference Room: 13:00** :

All of the village jonin had gathered in the conference room to hear the reports of the graduating class of genin. So far, they were very disappointed because Teams 1-6 had failed their jonin appointed tests.

A young dark haired female jonin with red eyes stepped forward to speak, "Kurenai Yuuhi reporting on team 8 consisting of Kiba Inuzuka, Hinata Hyuuga, and Shino Aburame. Results: Pass." The surrounding jonin were pleased that one of the teams had passed but the males in the room felt slightly bad for the male genin having the "Ice Queen of Konoha" as their sensei. Next a man who was smoking a cigarette and a sash with the Fire Nation crest on it stepped forward to speak.

"Asuma Sarutobi reporting in on team 10 consisting of Ino Yamanaka, Shikamaru Nara, Choji Akimichi and the result of passing," said the man now identified as Asuma. The surrounding jonin were not all that surprised by this result. Finally Kakashi, who arrived just five minutes late, stepped forward and everyone held their breath. It was common knowledge that no one had ever passed Kakashi's test since he had been added to the jonin sensei roster.

"Kakashi Hatake, reporting in on team 7 consisting of Sasuke Uchiha, Sai Shimura, Sakura Haruno, and Naruto Uzumaki and the result of passing." Kakashi said and most of the jonin's jaws dropped to the ground. The Hokage took and inhale from his pipe, smoking seeming to be a family habit, before speaking.

"I would like for all the jonin who either passed or failed their teams to write up a detailed report on the tests. This way we can see what can be improved before the next year. You are all dismissed except for Kakashi." Sarutobi said while waving his hand in dismissal. The gathered jonin left, but before he left Hayate handed Kakashi two pieces of paper, one being his training schedule with Naruto and the other being Sai's schedule with Danzo, who had given it to Hayate to pass along. When the room was empty, Sarutobi spoke,

"So Kakashi, tell me how your team did really and do not skip out on any details."

"Hai (yes) Hokage-sama. At the beginning of the test all of the genin scattered and hid. Their stealth is above average for new genin when you combine their efforts, since I was able to locate three of them. Naruto was completely undetectable which we both know is not surprising. After a few minutes I engaged in Tai and ninjutsu spars with a group of Naruto clones. By the way we should classify the 'Sexy Jutsu' and 'Sexy Harem Jutsu' as kinjutsus (Forbidden), while they seem harmless; they are a perfect anti-male and anti-pervert jutsu, since the clones nearly got the bells that way. I discovered that Naruto has mastered a few Uzumaki hijutsus and the exploding clone. I disabled Sakura and tied her up. I waited for a while for the others to make a move, but nothing happened. It turns out that with 70 minutes left Sasuke cast a genjutsu on me which was so subtle that I am ashamed to say that I completely missed it until it was too late. Sai had two of his lion drawings attack and trap me in wire while Naruto took the bells and freed Sakura. It is apparent that the guys understood the true meaning and were willing to take big risks to help their captured teammate." Kakashi stated and Sarutobi smiled pleased with the prowess the genin showed.

"Hokage-sama, may I ask a question," said Kakashi and proceeded with Sarutobi's nod. "Sir I was wondering why you are allowing a ROOT agent on a team of genin, not that I mind Sai. He seems like a good kid and not at all like the other ROOT agents I have worked with. Also what has Hayate been teaching Naruto."

"Kakashi in answer to your first question, the decision to have Sai as a ROOT agent on a genin team was decided back when Naruto was born. The Elders and I agreed that Naruto would need protection and support, though we did stipulate that the agent was not to have too much emotional conditioning. As you know Kakashi, ROOT is an organization that does the darkest and most questionable jobs, but they are the most loyal to the village and the ROOT director. Danzo and I settled differences on this long ago under the understanding that since we are both old with the same goals, that I would run the public image and village as Hokage and Danzo would run the darker side of the village, but would always answer to me." Kakashi nodded, the way Sarutobi explained it made sense to him as a former ANBU, a.k.a. Inu (dog). Sarutobi continued, "As for what Hayate is teaching Naruto that is pretty obvious. Hayate is teaching Naruto kenjutsu and undoing the academy's sabotage on his Nin and taijutsu. Hayate over the past three weeks has reported that Naruto's taijutsu after working with one of the Uzumaki styles has shown marked improvement. His ninjutsu capability is extremely high when the Eddy hijutsu are taken into account. However, Hayate is constantly praises Naruto's ken and fuinjutsu, stating that he is a true prodigy in those arts. In the last report I received, Naruto has mastered Leaf style kenjutsu and is already making his own seals."

Kakashi was flabbergasted. Here he was the student of the Yondaime Hokage, a sealing master, and Kakashi had only novice sealing knowledge. His own genin student was already making his own seals. Sarutobi was resisting the urge to laugh at Kakahsi's stunned face.

"Although I must mention the reason Naruto did not show his kenjutsu in the test is because, I have not yet given him authorization to carry a sword outside of training yet. As for his fuinjutsu, if my hunch is correct the reason you could not detect the genjutsu is because he more than likely put a camouflage seal on his teammates." Kakashi's visible eye widened at this realizing that the entire time he was distracted by clones and illusion, three of his students had been cloaked and strategizing.

Later that night across the village, Hayate smiled as he walked away from Battousai Weapons Store, which specialized in making made to order weapons along with any weapon in the shinobi universe imaginable. He was carrying two wrapped packages that he had put into order 3 weeks ago. Hayate thought to himself that his otouo/student would be over the moon from the gifts and that his sensei was smiling in heaven.


	4. Chapter 3: The Wave Mission Part 1

**Quick Author Note:**

 **Thank you to everyone who is reading my story and helping me by offering me advise and reviews. I greatly appreciate the support.  
**  
 **To New to Naruto: I have a plan for the Civilian council and how to end their meddling. It will happen in future chapters.**

 **To Twisted Pxl: You are right that Sakura needs a wake up call and I already have one planned. I don't want to give out any spoilers, but it will happen.**

 **Now on to the Story:**

Chapter 3: Into the Wave

 **Three Months Later: 06/7: 17:30** :

Deep in the forest of Konoha as shadow darted into a clearing and stopped sniffing around before settling in for a nap. What it failed to notice where the four sets of eyes of its, hunters, which it had assumed to have lost.

"This is Blossom, northern escape route secured."

"Red Eye here, eastern escape route secured."

"Inky, southern route secure and Naruto I Do NOT like this code-name."

"Sunshine here, west is covered and I am not in charge of code-names blame Cyclops."

"Alright you four on my signal move in for the capture," said Cyclops aka Kakashi. "Ready… go!"

The four genin moved in on the target, the infamous cat of the Fire Daimyo's wife, Tora. After a brief scuffle in which all the male members of team 7 were viciously scratched, Sakura held a fighting Tora in secure hold.

"Okay listen here cat; I am tired of having to catch you when you run away. The next time we have to catch you I am going to place three seals on you; one to paralyze you so you can move from where ever you are hiding, a second one to remove all of your fur for an entire year and finally a seal that will not allow you to be more than five feet from your owner at all times," growled Naruto. The cat's eyes changed from fury of being caught to terror at the threat Naruto made. The other genin and Kakashi were enjoying Tora's reaction. The group headed back to the Hokage tower to report in. As they walked Naruto made a comment that they could be training or taking higher rank missions instead of the chores and the others nodded in agreement, while Kakashi thought back to the first day of training with his team.

 **FLASHBACK** : **Three Months Prior to Present** : **12:00**

Kakashi strolled on to the training grounds for their first lessons as a team, but what he saw nearly made his jaw drop. There were hundreds of Naruto clones divided into separate groups each performing a different activity. One group was going through all the katas of Leaf style kenjutsu with a dull blade, while another group was working on taijutsu. The next group was reading books on a wide variety of subjects from history/politics to advanced fuinjutsu written by Minato Namikaze. The last four groups were working on sealing formulas, reading the Uzumaki scroll, practicing ninjutsu, and what looked like a book on hand signs. The real Naruto was doing warm ups while Sai and Sasuke were sparring. Kakashi saw that Sasuke was not using his Sharingan, thus making the match a little more even. Sakura was just watching the fight with stars in her eyes. After a moment, Kakashi call the team together and Naruto started to dispel his clones in small groups. Kakashi gave them a brief rundown of how they would operate (warm up, training, mission) before starting on a group warm up, since Sakura had not done so yet and in order to foster team work. By the end of the warm up, Sakura was panting and Naruto was moving slowly as well. When asked why he said that on top of his other warm up he was having trouble adjusting to the new level on his weights and resistance seals. When they all looked confused, Naruto showed them that he was wearing metal bracelets on his arms and legs along with seals on his belt and flack vest (non-standard issue that he had added since the genin test). All of this gear had gravity and resistance seals placed on them. He had gotten the idea after watching some guy in a green spandex uniform take off weights and being able to move extremely fast and hit harder. Although Naruto admitted that the seals would have worked placing the seal directly on the body, Naruto made mention that he did not want to press fate by placing seals directly on his person. Instantly Sai and Sasuke asked for some as well to increase their training, and Naruto handed out some he had already prepared, he even gave some with just resistance seals to Sakura. She took them but politely declined their use. Naruto asked Kakashi if he wanted some but he showed Naruto that he was already wearing his own seals.

If Kakashi had thought their afternoon meeting was a shock, when Hayate met them after team training at 14:00, he about went into cardiac arrest. Naruto ran up to Hayate calling him nii-san, and internally Kakashi was floored with jealousy. The ban on Naruto's mother's students was lifted, however the ban on his father's was not as it would require that Naruto's full heritage to be revealed. Kakashi was as close as he could get at the moment by being Naruto's sensei. Hayate then presented Naruto with two packages saying they were gifts for passing the genin test, becoming a shinobi and for when he could not get him things in the past on his birthday. Naruto opened the smaller package pulling out an orange gold hilt designed to with a circular pommel. Hayate instructed Naruto to channel chakra into the hilt and after he did the ends of the handle changed into a kodachi on one end and a brush that looked to me make of fine smooth metal wire on the pommel end. Hayate explained that both the brush and kodachi were made of adamantium chakra metal, making them impossible to brake, impervious to rusting/chipping, or going dull. In addition by channeling chakra into the brush it produced a special chakra ink that could write on anything and only where the brush touched, which was perfect for sealing in battle. This had Sai instantly fascinated as his own brushes for his jutsu had a tendency to allow the ink to bleed in undesired ways. The second gift was just as amazing as the first, it was a beautiful wakizashi with a deep forest green sheath, burnt orange hilt (think fall leaf orange), an adjustable golden strap on the sheath, and the tsuba (guard) was an orange whirlpool in honor of its wielder and his ancestry. The blade of the wakizashi was also made out of the same adamantium chakra metal, and when asked about the cost of because of the price of adamantium chakra metal is expensive, Hayate waved it off saying he and Kushina's other students had been saving since Naruto was born. Although Hayate, told Naruto that he was not to use the weapons on D-rank missions and not to channel chakra into the blades until he had completed the advanced stage of chakra control. Naruto thanked Hayate profusely, hugged him, and told him that he was going to add a blood seal he learned to make sure his new tools only could be used by him, to which Hayate approved of after all a swordsman's blade, is an extension of himself.

 **FLASHBACK END: Present Time: 18:30: Mission Office: Hokage Tower** :

As team 7 entered the mission office, the Daimyo's wife rushed to Sakura, taking Tora from her, and left after paying while nearly strangling the cat. Once the woman and cat were gone, the Hokage and Iruka were looking for a new mission for the team to take in the d-ranks.

"Excuse me Hokage-jiji-sama but can we please attempt a more challenging mission? These D-ranks are boring chores that in my opinion the civilians are just too lazy to do," whined Naruto in a slight professional manner. The rest of his team nodded in agreement, but Iruka shook his head and calmly started to explain the reason behind the D-ranks, about fostering team work and skill building, but when he noticed that no-one was paying attention his anger go the better of him.

"PAY ATTENTION YOU LITTLE SHITS!" Iruka shouted using his giant head jutsu. The genin stood at attention, but were a little put out at their old teacher yelling at them as a superior officer.

"Iruka-kun, I believe that they are ready for a simple C-rank. My students also have in the past 3 months completed the minimum 63 D-ranks required for a C-rank," said Kakashi not looking up from his porn. Iruka's face flushed red with embarrassment the honorific that Kakashi used (note as ninja have notoriously varied life spans, and as such they have no problem with the gender of a partner [Iruka was embarrassed by Kakashi saying kun in front of the hokage and Team 7]) and the Hokage chuckled softly, he had known Kakashi and Iruka were dating for a while and it was adorable to see them interact like this.

"Okay, why don't you four go home for the day while Iruka, Kakashi, and I discuss a possible C-rank mission," Sarutobi said with a gentle dismissal gesture. The genin left the office, and Kakashi put away his porn while Iruka snapped back into business mode.

"You honestly think they are ready for a C-rank?" Sarutobi asked in a serious tone. Kakashi replied with a nod. Iruka quickly looked at Kakashi's weekly progress reports, that the Hokage had insisted that all jonin write up now, and frowned.

"According to your reports, they work well on missions, but you say that when they are training there is massive strain between them can you clarify this," asked Iruka. With a heavy sigh Kakashi replied,

"The massive strain I mention comes from that excuse for a kunoichi Sakura Haruno. She refuses to train outside of team drills, and is obsessed with Sasuke who wants nothing to do with her fan-girl attitude. When she is offered help by Naruto she politely declines, but you can tell it is forced, and with Sai she is rude and insults him. I am surprised he doesn't put her in her place. As for the guys, they are sharpening stones for each other. Naruto uses his shadow clones to multitask while physically working out, sparring, and strategizing with Sasuke and Sai both of whom take their training seriously. In truth, the guys are ready for a C-rank, but I am hoping that a C-rank will open Sakura's eyes to the reality of the shinobi world and to her teammates." Iruka and the Hokage contemplated for a moment and then nodded in consensus with Kakashi.

"We will give you a C-rank mission, and please go inform your students to pack for a month trip. Have them report back here at 09:00 sharp, and be on time Kakashi that is an order," said Sarutobi sternly dismissing Kakashi. The remaining two searched through the mission scrolls for a suitable mission for the rookies.

"Ah, here we go this one seems appropriate." Sarutobi said with a slight chuckle.

"Hmm….. An escort mission to the Wave. Well it seems rather ironic that the rookie team making waves would end up in the Wave!" Iruka laughed not knowing how much was true with his statement.

 **Next Morning: 6/8: 09:00** :

As instructed, team 7 including Kakashi stood at attention waiting on the briefing of their mission. Sasuke was dressed in his usual grab along with Sai and Naruto was now carrying his wakizashi across the middle of his back like Sai with the hilt to the right side of his hip while Sai's was over his right shoulder. His gold kodachi hilt was holstered in a small holster on his left thigh opposite his kunai pouch on the right thigh (Naruto is ambidextrous). Naruto had been henged into his masked persona before entering the Hokage Tower, but dropped it the moment he was inside. He would be putting it back on after leaving the tower until they were outside Konoha. Kakashi sighed with a sweat drop looking at the travel pack of Sakura's and even the Hokage and Iruka looked disappointed in her.

"Sakura, why is your bag so big and heavy?" Kakashi asked.

"I just packed the necessities for a month sensei," she whined and before Kakashi could say anything Sai spoke up,

"Sakura-san, while you may believe you need all of that stuff, packing so heavy will slow you down and get you killed."

"Well you will probably die before me since I don't see any supplies on you." Sakura retorted. Sai was about to respond, but Naruto butted in trying to act as a peace maker sensing Sai's subtle anger and Sasuke's annoyance.

"Sakura, all of Sai's, Sasuke's, Kakashi-sensei's, and my stuff are sealed in storage scrolls I made. If you want I can seal your stuff into a scroll of your own, but first remove your battle supplies." He said and Sakura handed over her things slightly in shock due to Naruto's offer. Naruto pulled out an empty scroll from one of his pockets along with his golden hilt, and unsealed the brush half to write the storage seal while the mission was explained and the client was introduced.

"Hey what the hell is this? I asked for a protection detail not a bunch of snot-nosed punks. The girl looks weak, the two black haired guys are creepy, and the blond looks like an idiot still writing his grammar lessons!" Tazuna, the client, shouted. In a flash Sasuke and Sai were being restrained by Kakashi and Iruka inches away from Tazuna kunai in hand. Sakura was wide mouthed and offended while Naruto appeared to be oblivious.

"You do not need to worry, these kids are the top of their class and I am a high ranking jonin. We will protect you; however, a word to the wise, Sasuke the one I am restraining, is an Uchiha and not someone you want to cross. Sai the one Iruka-san is restraining is currently being scouted for our homeland security division, and Sakura is highly intelligent. As for the blond, not only is he a precious person to 98% of the people in this room, he is one of the few ninja in the country who is Fuinjutsu master on level with Jiraiya of the Sannin. He only lacks the field experience of Jiraiya-sama. It would not be wise to insult him while he is working on a seal or he could make a mistake and kill us all." Kakashi explained causing Tazuna to gulp a little in fear.

"Here you go Sakura; you are all ready to go. By the way sir something my sensei did not mention about me is the fact that I am also the kenjutsu specialist on this team and being such I could without much effort behead most novice opponents." Naruto said with an eerie fox grin that made Tazuna pale and shiver.

20 minutes later the six members of the traveling team were signing out with Izumo and Kotetsu, the eternal chunin gate keepers, when a voice rang out from behind them. Turning around the group saw Hayate running up to them followed by a woman with long purple hair in a jonin uniform and a katana strapped to her back like Hayate.

"Hey, Naruto-bo, glad we caught you before you left. Hey Sasuke, Sai, Sakura you all look like you have been working hard." Hayate said before the woman slammed a fist on the top of his head.

"You dork, I said that if they were on a mission it could wait until he got back," chastised the woman. She removed her fist and looked up at Naruto with a smile. "Hello Naruto my name is Yugao and I am this dork's girlfriend as well as a fellow student of your mother's. I was going to come see you earlier, but got put on assignment before I got the chance. Hayate told me that he gave you our gifts, and I just wanted to let you know that you are welcome at our place anytime. Also when you get back, you and your friends are invited to dinner with us." Naruto surprised Yugao by capturing her in a hug ecstatic, while Sai and Sasuke shook their heads at his antics. After saying goodbye to Hayate, Izumo, Kotetsu, and Yugao, the 6 members of team 7 set of for the Wave.

 **4 Hours Later (Civilian Pace = 1 Hours Ninja pace): 13:20: On the Road** :

The group was walking down the road at civilian pace in a modified diamond formation with Sasuke in the lead, Sakura & Tazuna in the middle, Naruto and Sai on the flanks, and Kakashi bringing up the rear. Sakura was chatting away with Tazuna about his country about whether there were ninja there and what it was like. Tazuna was answering most of the girl's questions but was avoiding answering too much about the Wave and Kakashi was vaguely paying attention to his responses. As they were walking Kakashi spotted a puddle off to the side of the road, and normally this would not be concerning if it had rained at any point earlier in the week. This meant this was a poorly disguised genjutsu. He glanced at his students to see if they had noticed the trap and was not disappointed. Sai had his hand resting on his tanto, Sasuke was slowly going through a string of hand seals for a less common Uchiha jutsu, Sakura was keeping an eye on Tazuna (though Kakashi was not sure she had noticed the trap at all), and Naruto looked care free playing with a paper ball one hand behind his head. Kakashi might have believed he did not notice the trap, if he had never been on the receiving end of Naruto's original mid-air paper bomb seals (the teen was frightening with his creativity towards seals and where he put them). After the group had made it several yards from the puddle two figures rose from it and charged Kakashi warping him in a bladed chain.

"One little piggy," the assailants said in unison as they tightened the chain shredding Kakashi to ribbons causing Sakura to shriek at the sight and Tazuna to pale in terror. The assailants kept moving heading in Sakura and Tazuna's direction when something flashed in mid-air in their path and in the next second they were thrown backward.

"Uzumaki fuinjutsu: Air bomb!" Naruto shouted as the assailants flew backward. They recovered and attempted to charge Naruto only to find the chain connecting them pinned down by Sai's tanto while he delivered a kick to each of them throwing them in opposite directions. The assailants disconnected from the chain and rushed in Naruto's and Sakura's directions. Before the one heading for Sakura got within five feet, Sasuke suddenly appeared inside his guard and delivered a punch right in his solar plexus saying "Fire style: Eruption Fist" as the assailant burst in to flames then falling to the ground burned and unconscious.

"Brother," the other one screamed looking away from Naruto whom he had just impaled with his clawed hand.

"Where do you think you're looking," said Naruto making his attacker look at him in disbelief that he was alive. "Kinjutsu (Forbidden): Exploding Shadow Clone," Naruto said before detonating in a puff of smoke that throwing the attacker back into a tree falling to ground to join his brother in the unconscious world. A moment later Kakashi walked out of the forest and Naruto jumped down from a tree. Sasuke and Sai tied up the two unconscious attackers and passed them off to Kakashi for interrogation. When he was out of sight Naruto turned to the other four.

"Hey old drunk, Sakura are you two okay?" He asked earning silent nods. Naruto then looked at Sai and said, "Sai could you unseal a first aid kit please." He then turned to Sasuke motioning him to come closer to him, which he did, before saying, "Sasuke good job with the Eruption fist. Although you need to be more careful when not using your Sharingan because as you moved inside his guard he grazed you with his claw. My clone noted that the claws were poisoned. I am going to treat the wound so hold still." Naruto gently rolled up the sleeve of Sasuke's shirt, took out a kunai, and enlarged the cut slightly to bleed a bit. After a minute of bleeding, Naruto took out a fine tipped wooden brush from one of his pockets and using Sasuke's blood began to write a complex sealing formula surrounding the wound. When he was done he performed a few hand seals (Turtle-Elk-Owl-Kami) and gently touched Sasuke's cut.

"Dual Seal: 2 Trigrams Poison Extraction, 2 Trigrams wound seal." Naruto said softly as the seals glowed faint blue, collapsed inward on the wound, and the cut steamed and closed. Sasuke blushed slightly at the warm feel of Naruto's chakra, and he quickly tried to hide the blush but Sakura noticed.

"Naruto what are you doing to Sasuke-kun," she shouted getting red in the face.

"Sakura-san, Naruto is just sealing my wound so it will heal faster. I am just embarrassed that I was grazed by that slow of an attack considering we spar at faster speeds. I guess it is to be expected since I didn't release my weights or the Sharingan," Sasuke said and Sai by this time had handed the bandages over to Naruto, nodding his head in agreement, though Tazuna looked puzzled by this.

"I thought that thing you did sealed his wound, so why are you bandaging it?" Tazuna asked as Naruto bandaged the wound.

"My seals removed the poison and closed the wound but it is only temporary because of two factors; one, I am not and will never be a true medical ninja that could completely heal this; two Sasuke is not an Uzumaki for which this seal was designed by to coincide with our extreme healing factor. Sasuke will have to heal normally but at least now the wound is clean, closed, and as long as he does not reopen it in the next 4 hours it will be fine." Naruto explained to the stunned Tazuna. Naruto handed the brush that he had used to write the seal to Sasuke who burned it in understanding. A few minutes later Kakashi returned and demanded answers from Tazuna about why B-class missing ninja were hunting him. Tazuna explained that the Wave was a poor country on the verge of extinction because of the control of a shipping tyrant named Gato, and that the bridge he was trying to build would open the country to land traders and end Gato's monopoly. Kakashi pinched his brow at the situation his team was in because their simple C-ranked escort mission had just become a B or A ranked mission.

"Well team we are at an impasse, we can either continue or turn back." Kakashi said giving his team a choice even though as their commander he could easily veto them.

"We need to go back we are not ready for this," cried Sakura causing Tazuna's face to fall with his spirit.

"I say we continue on because as ninja it is our job to protect those weaker that ourselves. I was weak once, but never again and I refuse to let that happen to anyone if I can prevent it. I never go back on my word because that is my nindo, my ninja way." Naruto said with such conviction Tazuna regained his hope and when the other two boys nodded in agreement his spirit soared.

"Okay we will continue, but we are sending notice to Konoha about the situation as well as a request for back up and transport for the prisoners," said Kakashi pulling out a scroll and wrote down the details. He was about to bite down one of his thumbs when Naruto spoke up,

"I can handle the message delivery sensei by sending a clone and leading them to a rendezvous point." Naruto then quickly spawned a clone that collected the scroll from while the original pulled out a medium size blank scroll and his hilt and began writing a containment seal for the assailants, who Kakashi had identified as Gozu and Mizu the Demon Brothers. When the seal was complete and the prisoners sealed, the clone took off it full speed for Konoha while the group resituated before continuing on their journey through the trees to avoid another ambush.

 **The Next Day: 6/9: Border of the Land of Fire and Wave: 14:30** :

Team 7 had made good time by traveling through the trees with Kakashi and Naruto alternating carrying Tazuna along with only one stop during the evening. The 6 of them approached the shore line where a ferryman was waiting for them to give them passage to the Wave. Tazuna and the ferryman exchanged pleasantries while the ninja scanned the area before getting in the boat. When the boat that was carrying them to the Wave reached 3/4th of the way across Naruto spoke,

"Well, the Demon Brothers are delivered and Hokage-jiji is going to add their bounty to our pay. However, there were no teams of chunin available to assist, so instead team 10 and Hayate-nii-san are coming as our backup. My clone that was with them just dispelled due to lack of chakra, but it is okay since they are about only an hour behind us. Although they will be tried when they catch up since they ran all night." Sai and Kakashi nodded thinking that having two more jonin would be beneficial to the mission, while Sasuke looked slightly worried that even though backup was on the way they would be exhausted and a liability until the next day. Sakura looked relieved and slightly annoyed at how Naruto referred to the Hokage and Hayate. She never said anything before especially in the presence of the Hokage, but the lack of respect that Naruto seemingly showed was getting on her nerves. A few minutes later, the ferry reached the shore and the group disembarked. The ferry turned around and headed back to bring the back up across. He initially refused but then Naruto paid him 50,000 ryo to go back for the others. Everyone was shocked that Naruto had brought that and had money with him, and when asked about it he merely replied that growing up alone gave one an excellent understanding of finances. There is also the fact that he and Sasuke had been paid for the B ranked mission with Iruka just before leaving.

As they continued to walk at a civilian's pace towards Tazuna's house Kakashi was deep in thought because the Demon Brothers while B-ranked missing ninja from Kiri (Hidden Mist Village in the Land of Water) they were known to never work alone. This thought begged the question, who were they working with. Suddenly, Kakashi looked up to see Naruto throw a kunai into the bushes off to the side of the road. Sakura shouted at him not to scare her like that and to retrieve his weapon. He retrieved it quickly along with carrying a terrified snow white rabbit. This concerned Kakashi because it was mid-summer and the rabbit's fur was still white. Then it hit him, the rabbit was used for a substitution and was confirmed when he heard the low whistle of an approaching weapon behind them.

"Get down," ordered Kakashi and everyone dropped to the ground as a giant sword flew over their heads, and imbedded itself in a tree followed by a tall shirtless man with arm warmers and bandaged face landing on the handle.

"Not bad for Leaf ninja," the man on the sword said with a deep resounding voice. Team 7 looked up to the man and noticed that he was also sporting a slashed Kiri headband. The missing ninja jumped off his blade bringing it with him and appearing on a nearby lake.

"So I was right, the Demon Brothers were working with a bigger fish. Although I just never imagined the bigger fish would be a barracuda like you Zabuza Momochi." Kakashi said directing the genin and Tazuna's attention to the swordsman.

"No wonder the Demon Brother did not return to base, especially when facing off against Copy Cat Kakashi," snorted Zabuza.

"Team defensive formation 20 guard Tazuna while I handle this and don't worry I will protect you." Kakashi said removing his headband from his left eye revealing a fully matured Sharingan. Zabuza created a mist and the team jumped into battle positions with kunai drawn and Naruto and Sai with hands on the hilts of their swords. Zabuza made a back handed comment about kids pretending to be ninja and playing with swords which almost caused Naruto to shout back in anger but he stopped himself. Zabuza attempted scare tactics but releasing his killer intent on the genin, but when that failed to work he appeared in the middle of the formation trying to finish them off. However, he was blocked by Kakashi and the two began a brief dance of killing each other's water clones before Kakashi became trapped by Zabuza's Water Prison jutsu after landing poorly on the nearby lake's surface.

"So much for the great Sharingan no Kakashi, the man who copied over 1000 jutsu, if you fell into such a trap." Zabuza mocked as he proceeded to make a water clone and sent it at the genin and Tazuna.

"Run! Get away from here with Tazuna, the clone can't move too far from the water," yelled Kakashi slightly desperate to save his students even though he trusted their skill. He felt that an opponent like Zabuza was way out the league of opponents that his students could handle.

"Good advice if your students weren't so petrified with fear," taunted Zabuza as his clone swung his sword to decapitate the group. As soon as the blade hit, Sasuke, Naruto, Sai Sakura, and Tazuna puffed into smoke.

"What, how?" Zabuza said while Kakashi was thinking the same thing. Just then Sasuke jumped from a nearby tree and called out, "Fire Style Grand Fireball!" He then took a deep in hale and blew out a huge blast of fire at the clone, which barely dodged and delivered a kick to Sasuke's gut sending him back several feet. The clone was about to charge at Sasuke when 50 Narutos sprang from the surrounding bushes and dog piled on the Zabuza clone.

 _Kakashi's genin definitely have decent team work and talent even if they are foolish enough to challenge me head on_ Zabuza thought. In the meantime, the clone dispatched the Narutos and redirected his attention to Sasuke who un-furled a demon windmill shuriken. He spun a few time building up momentum and hurled the shuriken. The clone easily dodged it but the original realized the attack was meant for him. Zabuza quickly grabbed the shuriken with the hand that was not maintaining the water prison and was about to gloat when he had to jump to narrowly avoid two more of the shuriken.

 _The kid threw three and hid them in the shadow of each proceeding one. What the hell has Kakashi taught these kids_ Zabuza mentally ranted. He was broken out of his train of thought when the second shuriken exploded sending the third hurtling into the air where it puffed to reveal Naruto with his wakizashi drawn and plummeting at Zabuza.

"Dance of the Falling Star," said Naruto as several copies separated from him attacking Zabuza at different downward angles forcing him to release the water prison in order to dodge. Naruto landed and jumped back to the shore after the jutsu failed to hit its mark and helped Sasuke finish off the clone with an X shaped slash with his two swords at the clones back.

"What the fuck! How is a leaf genin so skilled to use that advanced of a technique?" Zabuza shouted. He had never met a genin with such talent with a blade before with the exception of his old teammate Mangetsu from the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist.

"That really should not be your concern right now since I am your opponent," Kakashi said coldly locking eyes with Zabuza his Sharingan spinning fast. An intense battle of water dragon jutsu commenced while Zabuza's mentality was cracking, thus giving Kakashi the final opening he needed. He ran through a dozen hand seals and shouted, "Water Style: Water Cyclone jutsu." Water rose from the lake and blasted Zabuza across to the shore and slammed him into a tree, where Kakashi quickly pinned him down with kunai.

"Can you see the future?" Asked Zabuza weakly.

"Yes and this is where you die," stated Kakashi, but before he could deliver the final blow two senbon needles pierced Zabuza's neck.

"I thank you for wearing him down for me," said a voice from a tree. Looking up Kakashi, Naruto, and Sasuke saw a masked boy with black hair standing in the tree. Kakashi estimated him to be about the age of his students. After a brief discussion, the hunter-ninja grabbed Zabuza and shushinned (body flickered) away.

"Good work you two, but where are the others?" Kakashi asked panting slightly.

"As soon as the mist settled in and you and Zabuza were dueling I created and henged (transformed) the clones to take our place, while Sai and Sakura took Tazuna home to guard him and his family." Naruto said with a grin and a serious tone.

"Meanwhile, I activated my Sharingan to keep an eye out for an opening to jump in and assist. I managed to copy a few of the jutsu that you and Zabuza were throwing around, but I am not sure if they will all work for me. Team 10 and Hayate-senpai arrived mid-battle and I sent them off to Tazuna's to rest," continued Sasuke.

Kakashi eye smiled at their planning and teamwork. "Good job you guys. I am mad that you disobeyed my orders to run, but I will forgive you since your plan to protect yourselves and the client actually worked. Now if you don't mind I am going to pass out." He said as he closed his eyes and pitched forward; however, he was caught by Naruto and Sasuke. They both sighed and proceeded to drag their teacher back to Tazuna's.


	5. Chapter 4: The Wave Mission Part 2

**Chapter Four: Interlude of the Wave**

 **The Next Day: 6/10: Tazuna's House: 19:50** :

Kakashi awoke in an empty room lying on a cot. While he was orientating himself with his surroundings, the door to the room opened and someone stepped inside the room. Turning to the door, Kakashi locked his right and only visible eye on Gekkou Hayate who was giving him a raised eyebrow look.

"You just had to overuse that eye of yours," Hayate grumbled, "Well everyone is gathered downstairs eating dinner. Do you need a hand to get down there?" Kakashi nodded and Hayate knelt down bringing Kakashi's right arm over top of his shoulder and lifted him up assisting Kakashi in hobbling down the stairs to the dining room. When they entered the dining room several minutes later, Kakashi's students let out a sigh of relief and Kakashi eye smiled. Hayate set Kakashi down in an empty chair and got him some food from Tsunami, Tazuna's daughter. Everyone resumed chatting while Kakashi ate; Sasuke and Sai were talking with Choji about how training was going among other things, Sakura and Ino were gossiping over latest village rumors, Shikamaru and Asuma were playing shogi quietly, Tazuna and Tsunami were talking while she cleaned and he drank, and Naruto & Hayate discussed the battle/his usage of jutsu in the fight/ Zabuza's blade. Finishing his food, Kakashi decided to address the situation.

"Well now that we are all settled, I think we need to go over a few things. Shall we do the good news or the bad news first?" Kakashi asked bringing the group to a silent attention.

"Troublesome," mumbled Shikamaru, "Let's hear the bad news first." The others nodded their heads in agreement figuring it was best to get it over with like ripping a bandage off.

"Zabuza is alive," stated Kakashi. Sakura's and Ino's jaws dropped in horror, Choji stopped eating, Asuma and Hayate frowned, Sai's face went blank, and Naruto and Sasuke stiffened.

"But how Kakashi-sensei? We saw that hunter-nin kill him." Sasuke said confused glancing at Naruto for confirmation. Naruto scowled slightly then face palmed making everyone stare at him.

"Of course! The hunter-nin used senbon," groaned Naruto. The jonin nodded in understanding of Naruto's realization, and Sai and Sasuke shook their heads as well with Naruto's statement.

"Ano, what do you mean Naruto?" Ino asked nervously afraid of the answer.

"Ino, senbon are used mainly for disabling a target and required extensive knowledge of human anatomy in order to be used properly. The hunter-nin struck at Zabuza's neck, which can give a false death effect if the correct trigger points are hit. What Kakashi-sensei is implying is that the hunter-nin is more than likely working with Zabuza. He faked Zabuza's death in order to evacuate his ally." Naruto explained and Ino started to berate herself internally for forgetting this fact. She was after all the daughter of an interrogator along with her godmother lecturing her about different weapons usage (Ino's godmother in this story will be Anko which is another reason why Ino is not a fan-girl [Anko would have put a stop to that real quick]). Kakashi nodded at his student for his accurate explanation while Hayate smiled.

"Good summary Naruto," complemented Kakashi, "now the good news is that based on the method the hunter-nin used and all the injuries he received, I estimate we have two weeks before Zabuza will make another attempt. So we are going to get your seven up to snuff to be ready to hold your own. We start in the morning." He eye smiled and the evening progressed in relative calm except when meeting Tazuna's grandson Inari. Inari was very hostile to the Konoha ninja and bluntly stated that they were just going to die at Gato's hand.

 **The Next Day: 6/11: 09:00** :

The next morning found the seven genin and the three jonin in a forest clearing behind Tazuna's house. Kakashi while leaning on his crutch looked at his students anxious faces. Asuma took his team a little further on while Hayate chose to stay with team 7.

Eye smiling at his students Kakashi said, "Alright team, today we are going to learn an important shinobi skill called Tree walking." Everyone minus Sakura face faulted after he finished.

"Are you fucking serious Kakashi, you have not even taught them that simple exercise, what have you been doing for the past three months?" Hayate roared in a mix of confusion and frustration. Kakashi mumbled something about instilling teamwork ethics and teaching to the lowest common denominator/team liability while subtly glancing at Sakura. Sakura who completely missed what Kakashi was implying then spoke,

"What do you mean sensei?" He explained that this technique was used to climb trees, which caused the girl to reply that they already knew how to do that until he mentioned that they were going to climb the trees without use of their hands.

"Kakashi-sensei, um Sai, Sauske and I already know how to do this." Naruto said and the three males walked off to a tree each proceeding to walk up them with no effort.

"How do you know this," asked a slightly stunned Kakashi. He knew that Sasuke knew it because he taught him and figured that Sai knew it due to ROOT training. Seeing the look on Kakashi's face Hayate laughed at him, which caused Kakashi to look at him questioningly.

"Kakashi you witnessed firsthand Naruto using the Dance of the Falling Star, which I could not have taught him that or any of the advanced Leaf style kenjutsu without some chakra control." Hayate said with a sly smile. Kakashi sighed, turning his attention back to Sakura and explained Tree Walking and its benefits while the guys sat down and waited. Five minutes later, Sakura managed to climb the tree, but none of her teammates were surprised knowing that she had the least amount of chakra due to the lack of training and the diet she was on(note I am going to avoid being the scientific sexist saying that females are weaker than males since it is not always true, Sakura will have low levels due to the reasons above: Ino's will be slightly smaller than her male teammates due to only the reason that she is young and the difference it family techniques). Kakashi then lead the group to join team 10 at a nearby lake.

After joining team 10, Kakashi and Asuma explained the water walking exercise, the advanced stage of chakra control before the more advanced elemental control. This time everyone's jaw dropped when Naruto easily walked to the center of the lake and back with ease.

"Naruto since when can you perform water walking? I only mentioned it to you a week ago?" Hayate asked a little taken aback. He had figured at the time that Naruto would more than likely just research the water walking technique, but not actually completed it.

"Umm, about 2 days before we were assigned this mission. I had clones working on it constantly day and night until I got it down." Naruto said sheepishly rubbing the back of his head. "I wanted to start learning the Eddy style kenjutsu so I thought I would surprise you." Still a little stunned Hayate told him good work and that after the others got started on the water that the two of them would begin the basics of the Eddy style in a more private setting. Soon the rest of team 7 and 10 began attempting the water walking, while Naruto created 100 shadow clones and had them divide into groups (50 to water walk, 25 to practice taijutsu on the water, 25 to practice Leaf kenjutsu on the water) to work while he went to work with Hayate. The swordsman and his student retreated back to the forest clearing that team 7 had originally started in where Hayate began teaching Naruto the principles of the Eddy style that he knew.

Three hours later, the group took a break for lunch, back at Tazuna's. Sakura and Ino were exhausted, Choji, Shikamaru, Sasuke, and Sai looked slightly winded, but Naruto was just bouncing with energy. Also all of the genin minus the original Naruto were soaked head to toe from falling in the lake.

"Naruto how do you have so much energy," Ino whined. Laughing Naruto smile and replied cryptically about it being the benefits of an Uzumaki.

"What do you mean?" Shikamaru questioned which caused Naruto to look at Hayate for confirmation. Hayate nodded and Naruto responded,

"The Uzumaki clan was/is very unique and by the age of 10, we all have the chakra reserves of a kage level shinobi." The group from Konoha, minus Hayate, was stunned at the implications though it did explain Naruto's un-godly stamina (wink for later chapters). Hayate caught the eyes of Kakashi and Asuma and motioned them to the side while their students went inside the house.

"What is on your mind Hayate," asked Asuma.

"Kakashi, Asuma, I feel that even with water walking improving their chakra control and stamina it may not be enough to fend off Zabuza again. We got extremely lucky last time. Kakashi I don't mean to step on your toes or be disrespectful to you, but you need to actually start training your team in more than just teamwork drills. Those may be important skills that they will need in the future but right now if it were not for the individual training that your male students are doing outside of the team training, your team would be the weakest of all the rookies. You also need to get both yourself and Sakura into proper training mentalities. The Hokage, Kagura, Iruka, Ayame, and I have told you countless times that you cannot always rely on that eye of yours. Sakura needs to actually start training or she is likely to die on this mission. Asuma, you also need to motivate your genin some too. Shikamaru maybe a genius but that means nothing if he is too lazy to actually do something with that intellect. Choji just needs to be taken out of his comfort zone and switch to a different food for his clan techniques as the munching on the chips gives away his location. Ino is overall fine since if rumors are true Anko has been helping her prepare for interrogations. She just needs some more conditioning. Don't think that I am picking on you two, Kurenai came and asked Yugao and I for advice on her team, as she did not want to fall behind in preparing her team." Hayate said grimly. The other two nodded thoughtfully.

"What do you suggest then," Kakashi inquired interested to see what his fellow jonin was thinking while admitting to himself that he needed to start training again. His fight with Zabuza was pathetic considering his students managed to force the assassin back while he was trapped. Smirking slightly Hayate pulled out several small sheets of paper. The eyes of the other two widened considerably, and after giving the idea a moment of careful thought nodded in confirmation at Hayate's plan. Hayate pocketed the papers and the three of them walked back into the house to hear the genin chatting.

"Naruto, I was wondering why do you make clones every time we train?" Sasuke asked.

"Well to put it simple, the clones transfer knowledge/experience when they are dispelled. So I use them to gain more training in a condensed time period for certain things like chakra control and chakra manipulation. Plus they help me spot my own weaknesses and are a perfect scouting technique." Naruto replied. Sasuke and Sai looked content at the answer while the other genin's jaws fell open.

"Naruto would you permit me to copy that jutsu with my Sharingan." Sasuke asked which made the group as a collective go into shock, since never in recorded history had an Uchiha asked permission to copy another's jutsu. There were exceptions such as Mikoto Sasuke's mother; who typically never used her Sharingan unless it was a dire emergency. Naruto was the first to recover and replied,

"Sure Sas I will show you the jutsu when we get back to training. Although don't be disappointed if you can't make a lot or any, since this is a jonin level jutsu. I will also send some to guard you Tazuna so that you can work on the bridge." Tazuna nodded in thanks having taken the morning off, but needed to get back to working on the bridge.

After a few more minutes, the ninja left Tazuna's and made their way back to the lake. When they arrived, Sasuke activated his Sharingan while Naruto performed the Shadow Clone spawning a clone. Sasuke then proceeded to perform it as well and in a puff of smoke spawned 5 clones of him, but resulted in him panting heavily.

"Good job Sas. That was more than I expected you to make on the first try," complimented Naruto.

"Huff, thanks Nar, though I am amazed that you do this and produce more without a second thought." Sasuke said with a slight reddening to his face and everyone laughed at the hint to Naruto's energy. Hayate made a slight cough to get everyone's attention.

"Okay, before we continue with water walking I and your senseis are going to test you for your elemental affinities." Hayate stated looking at the genin.

"What do you mean by 'elemental affinities'," Choji asked munching on his chips.

"Elemental affinity is where your strength for elemental ninjutsu lies. The affinities are fire, water, earth, lightening, and wind. This is normally saved until you reach chunin in order to test to jonin level. However, we felt that given the situation it would be a good idea to have a few elemental jutsu handy for you guys to use. Now your natural affinity towards an element will make it easier to learn jutsu of that element as well as making them more powerful, but that does not mean you can't learn other elemental jutsu, it will just be harder to do so and they will not be as strong as your natural element/will cost you more chakra," explained Hayate. He fished out the small sheets of paper from his pocket and handed them out to the genin and the jonin. "Now I want you to charge your chakra into the paper, and depending on your element the chakra paper will react differently. If it ignites, then your element is fire; if it becomes soaked and damp, then your element is water; if it turns to dust, then your element is earth; if it crinkles, then your element is lightening; if it is split in half then your element is wind. We will demonstrate." The jonin held up their sheets of paper and channeled chakra into them. Kakashi's instantly crinkled, Asuma's split and then ignited, and Hayate's became soaked. The jonin then nodded to the genin, who then proceeded to do the same to their papers.

After a minute, the genin stopped channeling chakra into the paper to see the results, which had the jonin slightly stunned. Team 10's results were very complementary to their clan styles; Choji's turned to dust, Ino's had become soaked, and Shikamaru's had crinkled. Although team 7's results were very shocking; Sakura's turned to dust, Sai's became half soaked and dust though at the mid-point it had become black and wet, Sasuke's crinkled, then the whole thing burst into very hot flames, and Naruto's was the strangest. His paper first split down the middle, one side becoming soaked while the other crinkled, before they were ripped apart again. Naruto was staring at the remains of his paper intently.

"Wow even though I was expecting something like that it is still shocking," said Naruto casually.

"What are you talking about Naruto that should not have been expected?!" Kakashi exclaimed overwhelmed by his student's results. (Note: after lunch Kakashi had put away the icha icha book)

"Yes Naruto could you please explain why you said that? Possessing two elemental natures such as Sai and Sasuke are very rare and even their elements were unique." Asuma said turning all the focus on to Naruto.

"I am an Uzumaki," said Naruto like it was supposed to explain everything. Only Hayate realized what was implied having knowledge of Naruto's kekkei genkai, but the others were still confused. Hayate seeing this spoke up,

"It's okay Naruto they are your friends and comrades. As such they are honor bound to keep your secret. Go ahead and explain." This caused Naruto to smile at Hayate.

"Okay, well as most of you guys don't know due to the information being removed from records or hidden by the civilian council, the Uzumaki was and is an ancient clan that helped form Konoha but settled in their own village, the Village Hidden in the Whirling Tides located in the island nation of the Whirlpool country. My clan was nearly wiped out during the Second Great Shinobi war, and there are very few survivors left throughout the Elemental nations. We carry a unique kekkei genkai called "Chi o shiiru" (sealing blood), that like I said before gives us kage level chakra by the age of 10. The Chi o shiiru makes our chakra capable of multiple dominant elemental affinities, and upon perfecting our chakra control unlocks a unique sensing ability. Lastly like the name implies, the art of sealing is in our blood and therefore are born seal masters able to identify, understand, construct, operate, destroy, and who created any seal in existence." Naruto explained. Asuma finally understood why his dad had said the boy was special while the others minus Kakashi were taken aback by this information and could not deny any of it. Although Sakura and Kakashi were internally fuming for different reasons, Sakura for thinking Naruto was trying to up-stage her Sasuke-kun and Kakashi for forgetting that fact about his sensei's wife's family. He also wanted Naruto to look to him for advice like he did Hayate. He was starting to really regretting not taking the Hatake clan seat on the council right now.

Kakashi quickly cut off his internal rant and said, "Well it seems this generation is quite talented. Choji Sakura since none of us jonin are earth natured we can't truly help you with your elements, but I do know how to get you started. Shikamaru Sasuke I will help you with the lightening element, and Asuma can check your fire element Sasuke. Ino Sai since Hayate is a water elemental you two will work with him, but I want you Sai to work on earth as well to see if we can figure out that blackening of the paper. Naruto you have the choice of what to do." Naruto pondered his choices for a moment.

"Kakashi-sensei if it is okay with you I would like to work on my wind and water elements first, since we are in a country surrounded by water, our opponents use mist to hide in, and judging from my paper I have and extremely strong affinity for wind." Naruto said looking at his sensei hopefully which caused Kakashi to smile and nod. The jonin told the genin that they would not start on the elements until they could walk on water for 30 minutes non-stop, with Naruto being the exception. Although Naruto decided his water walking could be improved created a mass of 410 clones. He divided them up into three groups; 200 for Asuma to start on wind manipulation; 200 for Hayate to start on water; 10 to continue water walking. The clones walked off with the two jonin while Naruto and his clones walked out on the water, but before he got too far out, the original came back and sat down on the bank pulling out US (Uzumaki Scroll) vol. 1 proceeding to look through the tome. This confused Choji.

"Naruto, I know you said the clones help you gain more training, but what are you doing while they work it seems rather lazy to me." Choji asked and his teammates also looked at the blond.

"One of my clones that was with Hayate-nii, I mean Hayate-sensei created another clone which dispelled thus informing me that Hayate-sensei wanted me to look through my family tome to see if there are any more chakra control exercises or a way to start unlocking my sensing ability. So while it may not seem like work it actually is because I have to comb through this huge tome for that and trust me there is a lot to sort through." Naruto replied pacifying Choji and the others earning a few raised eyebrows (Ino, Shikamaru, and Sakura) at his slip in Hayate's name. The group returned to performing the water walking exercise while Naruto read. Five minutes later, Hayate and Asuma returned and began correcting the genin. While this was happening no one noticed Naruto smile and put away his book. A few minutes later when all the jonin and genin, with a little struggle, were standing on the water and timing their endurance, an enormous pulse of charka erupted across the area. The pulse not only startled the group, but also disrupted their control of their chakra causing the genin to fall into the lake along with Naruto's clones which dispelled upon falling in, while the jonin were able to readjust in time and stay above the water. As the genin resurfaced, the group heard Naruto on the shore laughing like a mad man.

"O man ha, sorry guys. I did not know that was going to happen." Naruto laughed as the group returned to the bank.

"What the hell did you do Naruto? Water Walking is troublesome enough without you doing whatever you did." Shikamaru complained loudly.

"I told you I was looking for more chakra control exercises in my family tome. Well I found a few, but all of them are designated for specific medical ninjutsu training, which is impossible for me to do properly (though he is able to do small wounds, like with Sasuke, his chakra due to the kyuubi's influence is slightly corrosive at this point in time). I did find a process on how to unlock my sensor ability, so I was working on that. It turns out that after mentally examining my chakra like the tome said, the chakra would guide the development of my sensing. It had me do what I believe blind shinobi call a Chakra pulse that works like echolocation. However, I guess I overestimated the amount to use and its range." Naruto answered sheepishly.

"Troublesome blonde," growled Shikamaru although the others minus Sakura were impressed. The pink haired girl was fuming that Naruto was once again trying to upstage her Sasuke-kun. She was starting to see what her aunt on the civilian council kept ranting about. (That is right everyone it is her aunt that is on the council, not her mother. Sakura's mother is a retired kunoichi.) Sakura was pulled from her thoughts as the others went back to training and she followed the crowd just like her aunt.

 **Five Hours Later** :

The ninja were sitting around Tazuna's kitchen eating dinner and having very light to no conversation due to how exhausted they were including Naruto. 30 minutes after Naruto's first attempt at the pulse he was attempting to make the chakra un-detected to the others but it was very slow going. The pulse was also very unstable in regards to the transferred information being either garbled or incomplete. Also in that half hour the rest of the genin passed the water walking test and the guys had started their elemental manipulation while the girls went back to tree climbing in order to build up their reserves so they could learn their elements later. At first Sakura had protested, but then Kakashi laid into her a bit.

 **Flashback:**

"But Kakashi-sensei, I already know how to do this why do I have to keep doing this." Sakura whined. Normally Kakashi would have given her a halfhearted excuse, but Hayate's assessment of how he was running his team made him resolved to change.

"You are going to do this Sakura to build up your endurance and chakra reserves. You need to have bigger reserves in order to perform ninjutsu." He replied, but then she whined again about being tired and that her diet had specific restrictions. This floored Kakashi and all the ninja, especially Ino as she knew first hand that being on a diet as a kunoichi is a big mistake.

"I don't care if you are tired Sakura. I told you to start climbing the tree and I expect you to do so until I tell you to stop or you completely run out of chakra. I am not your babysitter, I am you commanding officer. You will do as I tell you and you will not complain. Also you can forget about your diet, as of right now that is over, you will eat just as much as everyone else. Are we clear?" Kakashi shouted at the pink haired girl, who nodded in a terrified way.

 **Flashback End:**

Asuma had tested Sasuke's fire element by having him burn a leaf and increase the size and intensity of the flame. The result was a flame twice the size of normal and bright orange with blue flecks in color. Asuma said it was possible that with increased concentration Sasuke could evolve his flames and truly master the element, but that would not be advantageous given that their enemies favored water. So Sasuke decided to wait until after the mission to experiment with his fire and went to work on his lightening element with Shikamaru and Kakashi. The two genin were starting to train to conduct electrical sparks between their fingers. Choji was beginning to attempt to make small pebbles move toward him. Sai was doing the same as Choji in regards to earth, but he was multi-taking and working on his water manipulation. It was easy for him to begin the first step of drawing water to his hand from the lake, but when he did the water instantly turned black. Hayate examined the black water to determine what happened and he was amazed to find that Sai had subconsciously mixed his water element with a small amount of his earth to make a smooth combustible ink. He recommended that Sai make a conscious effort to separate his elemental chakra and after learning normal water jutsu then relax his restrain to add ink to the jutsu. Throughout the day, Naruto had made marginal success with his water manipulation, where he could pull the a small amount of water from the lake but not keep it in his hand, and wind manipulation, being able to cut 1/8th of the way through the leaf (I know that other stories and such use a leaf for all beginning stages of elemental training but I wanted to do something different. I also recognize that this is a very quick progression in some cases but remember that all of the genin are from ninja clans so they would be more adept at this type of training). With all this progress, the genin were hungrily shoveling food in their mouths.

"Hayate-nii-san, am I getting close to being able to start practicing channeling chakra into my swords?" Naruto asked thinking that these would be beneficial for the upcoming fight. Hayate was about to respond when Sakura yelled in frustration,

"Naruto would you stop being so disrespectful to Hayate-sensei. He is no relation to an orphan like you. I bet you were lying about having a clan and a bloodline, so stop trying to be so cool. You are weaker than Sasuke-kun and everyone else. I think that you should give Sasuke-kun those swords and Hayate-sensei should train him in that Eddy style not your worthless ass."

Naruto stared blankly at the girl like he had been slapped in the face. The others in the room had varying reactions. Kakashi was wide-eye, Hayate Sasuke Sai Asuma, and Shikamaru were glaring with anger at the girl, Ino and Choji were wide mouthed in shock, while Tazuna Tsunami and even Inari looked disgusted with Sakura's words. With blank glazed over eyes Naruto got up from the table and walked out of the house without a word to anyone. Sasuke rushed after him followed by Sai, whom as he left walked over to Sakura and slapped her across the face sharply before calling her a stupid cunt. As soon as the two boys ran off, Hayate took a deep breath to slightly regain his composure.

"Haruno-san, firstly Naruto is allowed to call me nii-san because outside of training, that is the nature of our relationship. I can't disclose much, but before her death I was a student under Naruto's mother. It was her wish that I and my fellow students treat him like family, and I personally see him as my little brother (otouo) since I am an only child. Secondly Naruto is in fact from a clan, but as he said when he explained his kekkei genkai they are nearly extinct like the Uchiha. Third right now you are the only member of your team that should be titled as weak, and Naruto is stronger than Sasuke in certain aspects because of their different specialties. Naruto is a ninjutsu, fuinjutsu, kenjutsu, and stealth specialist; whereas Sasuke is a ninjutsu, genjutsu, taijutsu, and tracking specialist. Sai is a well-rounded shinobi that is suited for body guarding and intelligence gathering, but you are the absolute weakest of this team. Fourth you should never tell a swordsman to give their blades to another, which is equivalent to ripping apart their soul. Naruto's blades were made specifically for him as a gift from all of his mother's students. Finally, I will not teach Sasuke any of the Eddy style kenjutsu because he does not fit the requirements for a true swordsman and the Eddy style is the birthright of an Uzumaki even I only know the most basic parts and will never be a master of it. My sensei, had her clan still been around, could have gotten a serious reprimand despite her position in the clan for teaching me and my fiancé what we know of the Eddy style. You are lucky that I am your superior otherwise I would have slapped you myself you foolish girl." Hayate said with such venom a snake would be jealous. He stood and left the table in the direction the boys had left, while the room went deadly still and quiet.

While Hayate was berating Sakura, Sasuke and Sai found Naruto sitting in a tree near Tazuna's with his head between his legs. The jumped up to his branch and settled next to him. Naruto looked up as they landed, silent tears streaming down his face. Sasuke and Sai each put a hand on Naruto's shoulders at a loss for the proper words to console their brother. Naruto gave them a small smile. Naruto was mature for his age having gone through so much in his life, but somethings would slip through and would emotionally wound him.

"Naruto," a voice called from bellow them. The boys looked down and saw that below them stood Hayate motioning for them to come down from the tree. The guys jumped down Naruto in the center with Sai and Sasuke flanking him.

"Otouo, I am sorry for what the bitch said to you, but I want you to know that you should not listen to her. She is brainwashed by her aunt and the council. My advice is to ignore her. I am going to talk with Kakashi about limiting the amount of time you are exposed to the pink demon, and I have a feeling he will more than willingly agree to the idea. Now on a lighter note we are going to start working on channeling chakra into your blades when you get the first steps to wind and water manipulation down." Hayate finished with a smile patting Naruto on the head causing the teen to smile weakly before being ushered back into the house with Sai and Sasuke.


	6. Chapter 5: The Wave Mission Part 3

**Chapter 5: Preparations and Reconciliations,**

 **Recap: 6/21** :

A week and a half had passed for the Leaf Ninja. It was a week full of intense training to which some of the genin affectionately called it "Training from Hell". Though the training was hard, the genin improved greatly to the extent that their jonin senseis were less worried about the final confrontation with Zabuza. Shikamaru was able to master the first steps in lightening manipulation and had added the Lightening Style: Electromagnetic Murder, Lightening Clone, and Illusion Lightening Pillars to his clan based assortment. Choji managed to complete the first stage of earth manipulation and added Earth Style: Mud Wall, Mud Clone, and Earth Armor to his growing jutsu list. Ino had managed to increase her chakra reserves quite a bit and started work on learning water manipulation. She had learned Water Style: Water Clone, though this was the only water jutsu she had mastered due to only recently starting to learn manipulation. Team 7 had improved the best as a whole throughout the week and a half. Sasuke had, with the help of the Shadow clones, completely mastered his first step in lightening manipulation and had learned the Lightening Style: Electromagnetic Murder, Lightening Clone, Lightening Ball, and Illusion Lightening Pillars. Sasuke had also begun to incorporate some of his clan's genjutsu into his style now, since Lightening Style: Illusion Lightening Pillars gave him the ability to cast multilayered genjutsu. Sai had managed to get the first stage of earth manipulation down along nearing complete mastery in water's second step and had added Earth Style: Mud Clone, Water Style: Gunshot, Water Clone, and Water Needles to his jutsu list for their normal elements. In regards to Sai's ink chakra he had developed Ink Style: Ink Clone, Ink Gunshot, Ink Jet, and Ink Needles with Naruto's help who seemed to have a knack for creating new jutsu. The two of them had found that after Sai had completed the first step in each elements manipulation, that he was able to separate his elemental chakra for each jutsu. They found that through a unique combination of using a fusion of the traditional hand seals for earth and water, Sai was able to stabilize the ink jutsu. Also with Naruto's help, Sai now had a way to fill and refill is ink well that he used for his Beast Imitation with his own chakra ink. Naruto had managed to completely master wind and water manipulation through extensive use of shadow clones which in total was an amount of clones that would make anyone pass out at the sight of especially a certain Hyuuga female. After mastering the elements, Naruto was able to learn Water Style: Gunshot, Water Clone, Water Dragon, and Wind Style: Beast Wave Palm, Kaze (Wind) Clone, Great Breakthrough, Great Vacuum Cannon, and Stream jutsus. Hayate had taught Naruto the Chakra Flow technique with help from Asuma, so Naruto could channel his chakra through his blades. He found that with his wind chakra flow, the length of the blade increased about five inches and was sharp enough to cut through steel kunai. With his water chakra flow, the blade produced mirages which confused the opponent on where the blade actually was while also increasing the fluidity of his movements. The three male members of Team 7 had begun work on a collaboration jutsu, which they thought/hoped could become a group signature eventually and Naruto was internally hoping that eventually once she got over herself and her obsession with Sasuke that Sakura would join in too. Sakura had made marginal progress in increasing her endurance. She had felt a small amount of guilt for what she had said to Naruto and had made an attempt to apologize.

 **Flashback: 5 Days Ago: 6/16** :

"Hey Naruto," called out Sakura on their way to training. She had attempted to speak with him sooner, but Naruto had been training away from the group with permission from Kakashi. Naruto stopped and turned his head toward her, and seeing his silent acknowledgement she continued to say, "I wanted to talk to you about what I said the other day." However, before she could say anything further Naruto interrupted her.

"Sakura I know you might be feeling a slight bit remorseful now, but let's face it right now the only reason you are feeling that way is because of what Hayate-sensei said to you. Maybe you actually do feel remorseful, but until you are actually feeling it without being guilted into it save us both the hassle and don't try. Please wake up Sakura, because right now you are weak because of the fan-girl lazy attitude you have. I will end up getting either you or someone else killed and I don't want that ." Naruto implored before walking away from the slack jawed girl who was starting to think about what he was saying.

 **Present Time: Dinner at Tazuna's: 6/21** :

The ninja were sitting eating with Tazuna and his family after a hard day of training. The bridge was nearing completion thanks to the help of Naruto's clones. Tazuna estimated that at the pace things were moving the bridge would be complete in another week and a half. This put almost everyone in high spirits. Naruto had also promised to reinforce the bridge with seals after its completion to make sure it lasted.

"Why do you bother, Gato is going to win and kill you all anyway." Inari said in slight frustration at the ninja's attitudes.

"Kid we are trained ninja, it will take more than a bunch of untrained hired thugs to beat us," said Asuma calmly.

"That does not matter, Gato will win. He always wins. You people don't know what it is like for us here. You don't understand how hard our lives are." Inari shouted at Asuma. Suddenly, the whole house was flooded with KI forcing Tazuna, Tsunami, and Inari, to choke, while the ninja minus the jonin started to sweat.

"Kid shut the FUCK UP! I am tired of your bitchy whining." Naruto growled at the boy focusing his KI on Inari. "I heard what Gato did to your Father Kaiza, but you have blown your depression out of proportion. You are too lost in your self-pity to realize what you have. Your grandfather is risking his life trying to save your country and restore your hope, while both he and your mother are here to give you love and support. All you do is bitch and moan all the damn time. Both Sasuke and I have had way worse things happen in our lives and we are still able to move forward. Sasuke's parents were murdered right in front of him and his entire clan wiped out. Currently his brother is a missing ninja charged with these murders. I myself have never known my parents. What I do know is what I am told about them, since they died the day I was born. I am only allowed to know my mother's name and her files are locked away from the archives. To top everything off, I am the village pariah. I have been hated all of my life by the civilian population of my village for something that was not even my choice. So don't cry over your lot in life because I would gladly have even a fraction of what you have." Naruto finished yelling and got up leaving the house, while cutting off the KI. Silence was left in his wake.

"Is what he said all true? Please tell me he was exaggerating." Tsunami whimpered. Kakashi looked up at the room, sighed and closed his porn.

"Unfortunately everything Naruto said was true enough. When I was in ANBU, I was one of the few who were assigned to watch over him from the shadows. I hate to tell you this, but what Naruto told you was an extremely watered down version. Naruto was kicked out of the orphanage at the age of four and was on the streets for a month before the Hokage was able to secure an apartment for him after dodging the restrictions placed by the civilian council. Naruto has been beaten more times and in more gruesome ways than humanly possible. All of Konoha's hospital personnel, who are retired shinobi, love Naruto, but are also terrified of the next time he is brought to them. None of the nurses and very few of the doctors can stomach some of the injuries that Naruto has had. Of all of the hospital staff, healer Yama and his wife Dr. Yama are the only ones that will take care of Naruto no matter what. His birthday is always when the worst beatings happen, hopefully this year now that he is a shinobi he won't get hurt. If it had not been for Naruto's friends, the Hokage, and a few other people Naruto might not be the same person he is today." Kakashi stated solemnly, which caused Tsunami and Inari to be crying and all the genin looked to be on the verge of losing their dinner because even they his friends had been sheltered from these facts. Sakura took a breath with a frustrated look on her face and was about to say something when Kakashi interrupted her saying, "Sakura I can guess what is going through your mind right now, but don't even try to deny anything I have said. In fact your aunt and the other civilian council members are responsible for the torture in Naruto's life, including the inability for any family to adopt him. Believe me when I say every single shinobi clan had tried more than once to adopt Naruto." That shut the pink banshee's thought process down and made her start to question what she had been told to believe.

Out in the woods, Naruto stood in a clearing focusing his thoughts attempting to control his frustration. He made a single cross hand seal producing 510 clones. The hand sign was not necessary as Naruto had learned to perform this jutsu seallessly, but his frustration caused him to need

"Alright you guys know the drill, now get to it." Naruto ordered and the clones responded moving to their tasks. The original Naruto began an all-out fight against 10 of his clones. As he fought, Naruto vented all his frustration and anger at his clones and within an hour had defeated them all. He made a hand seal to dispel his other clones, but that turned out to be a mistake due to the original 500 each making 50 copies of themselves, thus the total number of clones dispelled totaled 25,000. This caused Naruto to pass out with a groan due to information overload.

 **The Next Day: 6/22** :

Naruto lay sleeping in the clearing where he passed out the night before as a silent figure approached him. The figure was female looking in appearance with long black hair wearing a pink kimono and sandals. The person was carrying a basket in their hands. They approached Naruto looking at him curiously. The figure slowly reached out a hand toward Naruto, but Naruto's own hand shot up and caught the approaching hand. Opening his eyes Naruto looked at the figure in a slight daze.

"You should not sneak up on a sleeping person." Naruto said with a yawn sitting up and releasing the hand.

"Well you should not sleep outside. You could catch a cold." The person replied.

"Nah, that is highly unlikely," said Naruto with a chuckle as he stretched. "So what is your name and what are you doing out here so early."

"My name is Haku, and I am out here to collect herbs to help heal a sick friend," Haku said with a smile while in his mind he was thinking of how to get information on his master Zabuza's enemies from this guy.

"Nice to meet you Haku-san, my name is Naruto Uzumaki. Would you care for some assistance?" Naruto asked causing Haku to smile and nod. The two of them began collecting herbs while conversing lightly. Haku was internally getting frustrated though, the entire time he had been testing the waters trying to glean any information that might help Zabuza, and Naruto was avoiding answering. It seemed to Haku that Naruto knew that Haku was fishing for information. Although when Haku asked if Naruto had anyone precious to him, Naruto gained a huge grin on his face and replied that he had many precious people.

"Well then you will definitely grow strong to protect them," said Haku with a smile.

"Thanks Haku, but what about you? Is Zabuza your precious person?" Naruto asked which caused Haku to tense. "Don't get the wrong idea, I don't want to fight or kill you Haku, I am just curious."

"Yes he is. He saved me when I was a child. I owe him my life, and I live to be his tool." Haku stated still very tense waiting to attack or defend himself.

"I understand the life debt, but not where you are getting this tool mentality. How long have you been with him?" Naruto questioned.

"About 10 years, and it is rather rude to be asking things of me without some compensation." Haku half joked causing Naruto to laugh before saying,

"Well all I can say safely without giving you information that will lead to the harm of my precious people is that at least two other members of my team can relate and understand your situation. This includes me because we have had similar lives and histories as you. I have to wonder if you are only a tool to Zabuza or something more. You can call it my 6th sense, but I think there is something more to it than you being just a tool." Haku was struck by this thought. He had always considered himself just a tool, but Zabuza had always held off using Haku unless there were no other options. Pushing his thoughts to the side, Haku turned to a more important question.

"How did you know I worked for Zabuza-sama in the first place, and what do you plan to do?" Haku questioned Naruto.

"What gave you away was the way you carry yourself, which speaks of your ninja training. You move too quiet for a civilian, and trust me I know quite a bit about stealth and trying to remain hidden and quiet. Also your hair and voice are the same as the hunter-nin's. Now as for what I plan to do, I am going to help you collect herbs, and make you a promise that if you don't attack me I won't attack you. We can be friends if you want." Naruto offered. Haku nodded numbly having never been offered friendship. They finished collecting herbs and parted ways making plans to meet up the following morning. Although as Haku left he told Naruto that he was a boy hoping to at least get some humor at watching the reaction if Naruto thought he was a girl. Naruto just laughed and said, "You are quite beautiful for a boy. Your disguise would fool anyone except someone created the ultimate anti-pervert jutsu."

20 minutes later Haku was back at Zabuza's base mixing the herbs into medicine for Zabuza when the man entered the room slowly. He stood there watching Haku in the quiet for a few minutes before speaking.

"Haku what is on your mind you are quitter than usual."

"I was merely reflection on the current situation Zabuza-sama," Haku replied.

"What of it?" Zabuza scoffed thinking that Haku was having another moment of soft heartedness. While training the boy he had tried to rid Haku of this, but Zabuza was honestly glad he had been unsuccessful in doing so. Haku, in Zabuza's opinion, has a soul as pure as falling snow that Zabuza had no heart to corrupt that purity.

"This Gato character, can we trust him to actually pay us in the end, and not try to double cross/attempt to kill us. I also don't like those Ame (Hidden Rain) ninja that he hired alongside us. Something about them does not sit right with me." Haku said causing Zabuza to sigh.

"You make an excellent point, I am not 100% sure we can trust Gato. This deal is looking shadier than we are used to. I will look into this, but just in case we should set up a contingency plan. Maybe we could use those tree-hugging leaf ninja somehow. What made you suspicious and what seems to have you off kilter?" Zabuza inquired. Haku had always been the brains behind his brawn so Zabuza had trusted his judgment. That judgement had saved his life quite a few times.

"My suspicions have always been there. I mean why hire ninja to kill a simple bridge builder? Especially when a man like Gato has an army of bandits at your disposal. As for why I am off kilter, it is because earlier I encountered one of the Leaf ninja while searching for the healing plants that I needed. I was tempted to kill him where he slept, but I never got the chance as he awoke when I approached. He also knew I was the hunter-nin that took you away from the battle field by my movements and physical features. He made no move to fight or kill me. He intrigues me and we have agreed to meet tomorrow." Haku said with a curious look on his face. Zabuza was shocked.

"Which ninja was it," Zabuza asked since he had been blown away by the Leaf genin's skills. This leaf ninja had figured out who Haku was and did nothing about it, so this ninja had earned a little of his respect grudgingly.

"The blond swordsman and his name is Naruto Uzumaki," said Haku which caused Zabuza to choke.

"Did you say UZUMAKI?" He stammered. When Haku nodded Zabuza started to sweat. As a former member of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, Zaubza had learned to both respect and fear the Uzumaki name. They had been a clan of master swordsman that could easily best the swordsmen of the Mist without much effort. Also the fact that the seven swords of the Hidden Mist had been forged by the Uzumaki and given to the mist as a token of friendship (though not alliance) between the two aquatic nations. Zabuza thought that if what Haku said was true and this Naruto was truly and Uzumaki, then what the kid had done at the first encounter was barely scratching at the boy's talent and potential. If Haku could make an ally of this Uzumaki, then there were infinite possibilities in Zabuza's future endeavors.

"Haku, I want you to get close to this Naruto. It may be our way into making them part of our future contingency plan." Zabuza ordered.

"Yes Zabuza-sama, but may I ask a question," said Haku. Zabuza waited knowing Haku would take the silence as a green light to continue. "Naruto pointed out to me that to him I may be more than just a tool to you. I was wondering if his judgment has any grounding." When Zabuza did not reply Haku was going to leave the room disappointed that Naruto's feeling had no founding, but he was stopped by Zabuza's hand on his shoulder.

"Haku, yes I use you like a tool when we are working and in public in order to protect us both. However, the truth be told, you are more than just a tool to me. I am not ready to tell you what the full truth of what you are to me, but give me time and I will. This Naruto kid is perceptive. I will look more into Gato's history, so we are not caught unaware." Zabuza said causing Haku to smile and thanking him before leaving the room.

Meanwhile Naruto was back at the training clearing that he had been using since his argument with Sakura, while his clones were off in the forest continuing from where they left off last night, though with instructions not to replicate themselves over 50 times. Naruto himself was currently meditating sorting through the memories of his clones from the previous night. His clones had been working on being able to use the elemental chakra flow jutsu in his kenjutsu and taijutsu along with practicing going directly from ken or tai to the other seamlessly. The results were rough but promising with only about half a minute delay time in between switches. Naruto was about to start working on the chakra pulse exercise when Sai entered the clearing and sat down in front of him locking eyes.

"How much trouble am I in for not coming back last night," Naruto asked at which Sai sighed.

"Well all the jonin agreed this morning that you are not allowed to wander off alone again. Both Hayate and Kakashi were worried when you did not return at lights out, but you are not in trouble. Although Sasuke is ticked off, you will probably end up getting knocked in the head when he sees you. Choji, Ino, and Shikamaru figured that you were okay." Sai replied with a blank face.

"What about you, Sai?" Naruto pushed knowing that with Sai's ROOT training he was adept at hiding his emotions.

"Honestly Naruto, I am upset at you carelessness. You could have hurt yourself. It is my job as both your friend and body guard to protect you, and when you pull stunts like this I feel useless." Sai responded causing Naruto to lower his head in shame for causing his friend stress. Sai reached forward and put a hand on Naruto's shoulder in a sign of forgiveness. He then reached into his pack and brought out some food Tsunami and Ino had put together for him along with Naruto's shades that he had left at the house when he stormed out.

"Here have something to eat and your shades. Although I am surprised you have not done something to keep them from getting lost yet," Sai chuckled. Naruto's head shot up and a spark of energy lit up his eyes, which Sai and the others had come to recognize as either a brilliant idea had just occurred to him or a prank was soon to occur. Although the latter usually occurred in conjunction with a sly fox smile which made everyone want to flee. Naruto snatched his shades from Sai's hand.

"Sai correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't the Sharingan allow Sasuke to vaguely see the chakra flow of a person in order to mimic movements, chakra molding, and jutsu." Seeing Sai nod Naruto continued, "Well what if I could rig these shades to not only return to like a pocket when removed/lost/or summoned, but also to something along the lines of detecting body heat and all environment protection for the eyes." Naruto said practically bouncing up and down with energy.

"If you can do that then can I get a pair as well? That sounds ingenious considering our opponents are from the Hidden Mist (Kiri) and excel in the Silent Killing technique. Also in the future we could end up in diverse environments so we would need to protect our eyes. Could you add night vision too? " Sai said enthusiastically. Naruto pulled out a spare set of shades and asked for a little of Sai's blood so that he could make a personal seal for him. After the blood was drawn Naruto said that he would be back for dinner and Sai left to go work on his new ink style.

 **Several Hours later: Dinner Time: Tazuna's House** :

All the Leaf ninja minus Naruto were gathered around the table about to eat dinner when Naruto came running into the house with an excited smile stretching from ear to ear. Sasuke upon seeing Naruto grabbed the blond and delivered a punch to the top of Naruto's head when the blond was in range of his fist.

"You baka (idiot) don't stay out in the forest all night. You had us all worried!" Sasuke shouted while Naruto nursed his sore head. He muttered an apology which the group accepted and made room for Naruto at the table.

"So what troublesome thing had you all excited running in here," drawled Shikamaru.

"O well three things really: One, I managed to perfect my water chakra flow mirages so as not to be confused by them; Second, I was able to complete Sai's and my new weapons; Third and finally, I made contact with the enemy hunter-nin." Naruto said casually and everyone's jaws dropped to the ground. Naruto's achievement in regards to his chakra flow was nice but expected with how hard he trained. The vague mention of a new weapon stunned them because no-one other than Sai knew that Naruto was working on something like that. Sure they were aware that Naruto was working on creating jutsu with Sai, but making a weapon was news. However, the fact he met the hunter-nin was the most disturbing. Seeing the looks on their faces Naruto explained the entire encounter with Haku to the group while shoveling food into his mouth. After he had finished the story and his food, Naruto also told them of the meeting with Haku tomorrow, but was met with the majority against his plan. Sakura, Ino, Choji, and Shikamaru were against it due to the unknown factor of Haku complying with the non-aggression promise. Asuma was against it because it seemed too easy and was more than likely a trap. Sai, Sasuke, and Hayate were on Naruto's side thinking that this way an ally could be gained and the fight avoided. Kakashi was silent not taking either side while the group argued. The argument went on for half an hour until a major line was crossed by Asuma.

"Naruto you are being too trusting and naïve to think this hunter ninja will actually keep the terms of your agreement. No wonder you are considered the 'dead last' you trusted the wrong people. Don't throw away the talent that my father the Hokage sees in you just because you think someone who is our enemy will hold peace treaty terms." Asuma said, but as he finished the temperature of the house instantly froze and was filled with so much KI that Tazuna, Tsunami, and Inari, whom at lunch had made amends with Naruto, blacked out. Naruto locked eyes with Asuma focusing his KI on the man.

"Is that what you really think of me Asuma Sarutobi-sensei," growled Naruto causing Asuma to flinch a bit at the use of his full name. "You say that I am too trusting and naïve, but do you truly know how many people in my actual life that I trust? It is a relatively small group consisting of your father the Hokage, your nephew Konohamaru, the Ichiraku family, my friends on teams 7, 8, and 10, Hayate-nii-san, Iruka-sensei, the Yama family, and Inu-san aka Kakashi sensei." This shocked Kakashi who had thought that Naruto did not know that and upon seeing Kakashi's reaction continued, "You should realize Kakashi-sensei that I recognized you immediately by your hair and scent when we met at team assignments. Back to you Asuma-sensei, you should be aware that other than Iruka-sensei I never trusted any of the teachers at the academy. The reason I was labeled as 'dead last' is because my education was sabotaged. In truth I have an eidetic memory, know all the physiological traits that a person shows when being dishonest, and a natural sixth sense when it comes to a person's true nature which is a passive part of my sensing ability. For example, the hunter-nin absolutely hates to kill, prefers to heal and his soul is like snow, whereas Mizuki-teme was greedy like a rat with a dark soul. Now if you will excuse me I am going to transfer Sai's new weapon to him and go to bed." With that Naruto got up and left the room and the KI dissipated. All the genin minus Sakura (due to her still being brainwashed), Sai, and Sasuke had their heads bowed in shame. Kakashi was pensive and Asuma was frowning at the verbal lashing he had received. Meanwhile Hayate was torn between being angry at Asuma and laughing at the man who just got scolded like a child. Soon after finishing their food, Sai and Sasuke excused themselves giving Asuma an angry look as they left the room. Hayate got up and followed after the boys, but Kakashi pulled him down to whisper,

"Hayate, tell Naruto that both as his sensei and as Inu that I trust his judgment and plan but to be careful. I am afraid that right now if I were to say something to him he might take it the wrong way."

"Don't worry I will tell him. Hopefully soon, you will get the chance to be an older brother to Naruto like Minato-sama and you were hoping. Be patient, I have told Naruto that all of his parent's students were restricted from having any contact with him and the Hokage and elders are looking for loopholes for you for now." Hayate replied and Kakashi breathed a sigh of relief.


End file.
